Hydrogels Formed by the Self-Assembly of Collagen-Mimetic Peptides With a Constrained Backbone Structure

Self-assembling peptides have attracted increasing attention as building blocks for developing functional materials. Among them, collagen-mimetic peptides (CMPs) represent a class of self-assembling systems. However, although short-chain CMPs spontaneously fold into thermodynamically stable triple-helical trimers, they fail to further undergo supramolecular assembly to form hydrogels. We report a new strategy for supramolecular hydrogel formation based on CMPs. The designed peptide, termed kinkCMP, features a kinked backbone introduced at the center of the sequence via adjacent disulfide bonds. The kinkCMP forms a gel, and its gel denaturation temperature can be tuned by varying the peptide chain length. Moreover, the hydrogel can be used as a cell culture scaffold. These results provide a versatile approach for constructing supramolecular hydrogels based on CMPs, expanding the design strategies for peptide-based functional materials.