Dynamic Materials for Biomedical Applications

Dynamic hydrogels have emerged as an important class of materials for biomedical applications. We describe an approach to develop dynamic materials based on a ligandinduced protein conformational change. Specifically, when the protein calmodulin (CaM) was incorporated as a functional unit in hydrogel networks, its nanometer scale conformational change translated to macroscopic changes in hydrogel network properties. These materials enabled new approaches in biosensing, mechanical actuation, and drug delivery applications. There are over 200 proteins that undergo well characterized ligandinduced conformational changes. Therefore, the approach demonstrated here could provide a broadly applicable mechanism to form dynamic hydrogels that respond to an extensive range of specific biochemical ligands.