Nucleation on surfaces and in confinement

A review of recent literature supports the notion that organisms may achieve nanoscale control over the hierarchical assembly of organic-inorganic materials by compartmentalizing reactions into small volumes containing specifically functionalized macromolecules. Such confinement may introduce a degree of determinism to the stochastic process of nucleation by greatly reducing the number of nucleation events, allowing an organism to control nucleation using soft organic substrates. In this way, the polymorph, orientation, shape, and size of a crystalline building block can be selected, and its assembly into a larger structure orchestrated by the organic matrix.