Washington, Dec 4 (IANS) A breakthrough in assembling peptides at nano-scale could make futuristic devices like windows or solar panels that repels grime and dirt by itself.
Doctoral candidate Lihi Adler-Abramovich and a team under Ehud Gazit, a professor at Tel Aviv University (TAU) biotechnology department, have found a novel way to control the atoms and molecules of peptides so that they “grow” to resemble small forests of grass.

These “peptide forests” repel dust and water - a perfect self-cleaning coating for windows or solar panels which, when dirty, become far less efficient.

“It began as an attempt to find a new cure for Alzheimer’s disease. To our surprise, it also had implications for electric cars, solar energy and construction,” says Adler-Abramovich.

A world leader in nanotechnology, Gazit has been developing arrays of self-assembling peptides made from proteins for the past six years.

His lab, in collaboration with a group led by Gil Rosenman of TAU’s Faculty of Engineering, has been working on new applications for this basic science for the last two years, says the university release.

“We are not manufacturing the actual material but developing a basic-science technology that could lead to self-cleaning windows and more efficient energy storage devices in just a few years,” says Adler-Abramovich.

These findings were just published in Nature Nanotechnology.