Intrafibrillar Collagen Mineralization Produced by Biomimetic Hierarchical Nanoapatite Assembly

Abstract

Phosphorous-based templating analogs of extracellular matrix proteins are used as templates in conjunction with polycarboxylic acid-stabilized amorphous calcium phosphate nanoprecursors to create a highly ordered intrafibrillar apatite crystallite assembly within a collagen fibril. The assembly recapitulates the gap and overlap arrangement of collagen molecules. Detailed facts of importance to specialist readers are published as ”Supporting Information”. Such documents are peer-reviewed, but not copy-edited or typeset. They are made available as submitted by the authors. Please note: The publisher is not responsible for the content or functionality of any supporting information supplied by the authors. Any queries (other than missing content) should be directed to the corresponding author for the article.