Collagen Structure–Function Relationships from Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy

ConspectusThe extracellular matrix of a tissue is as important to life as the cells within it. Its detailed molecular structure defines the environment of a tissue’s cells and thus their properties, including differentiation and metabolic status.Collagen proteins are the major component of extracellular matrices. Self-assembled collagen fibrils provide both specific mechanical properties to handle external stresses on tissues and, at the molecular level, well-defined protein binding sites to interact with cells. How the cell–matrix interactions are maintained against the stresses on the tissue is an important and as yet unanswered question. Similarly, how collagen molecular and fibrillar structures change in aging and disease is a crucial open question.Solid-state NMR spectroscopy offers insight into collagen molecular conformation in intact in vivo and in vitro tissues, and in this Account we review how NMR spectroscopy is beginning to provide answers to these questions. In vivo 13C,15N labeling of the e...