Bioenabled surface-mediated growth of titania nanoparticles

A recombinant protein, silaffin rSilC, adsorbed on a tailored polyelectrolyte surface is capable of initiating the nucleation and growth of 4 nm titania nanoparticles in a dispersed manner under ambient conditions. The approach presented here may be readily applicable to other organic and inorganic materials to enable a robust synthesis of uniform organic-inorganic nanostructures with controllable dimensions and surface distributions.