Combining Rigid Cellulose Nanocrystals and Soft Silk Proteins: Revealing Interactions and Alignment in Shear

Natural materials, such as silk and cellulose, have an inspiring set of properties, which evolved over hundreds millions years. In this study, cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) regenerated fibroin (RSF) are combined to evaluate their suitability for filament formation. This is assessed by tuning characterizing the interactions between these two materials finally studying alignment mixtures under shear. To modify CNCs silk, with varying surface functionalities (sulfate and/or aminosilane groups) used. The compatibility components investigated using quartz crystal microbalance dissipation monitoring (QCM-D) photothermal atomic force microscopy (AFM-IR), show that ionic induce sufficient binding components. Then, CNC evaluated shear-induced polarized light imaging, indicates can orientate when not covalently bound. Finally, potential formation tentatively demonstrated industrial dry-spinning environment, where expected bring order alignment, whereas RSF provides soft more mobile regions further facilitate final structure.