Water-soluble nanomaterials

A team of scientists at the Johns Hopkins University has created water-soluble electronic materials that spontaneously assemble themselves into wires. These materials are of size and scale that cells can intimately associate with, having a promise for biomedical applications. The team used the self assembly principles that underlie the formation of beta-amyloid plaques, which are the protein deposits often associated with Alzheimer's disease, as a model for their new material. It is believed that they can be used to regulate cell-to-cell communication as a prelude to re- engineering neural networks or damaged spinal cords.