X-Message-Number: 21143
Date: Wed, 12 Feb 2003 13:21:02 +0100
From: Henri Kluytmans <>
Subject: structural stiffeness in biological applications

Thomas Donaldson wrote :

>I said that stiffness wasn't always a virtue. I will add here that even
>if it isn't a virtue, stiffness to the degree you get with your 
>diamondoid would simply be useless in most cases. 

At first sight, you wouldn't think that structural stiffnes would 
be important for the performance of artificial red blood cells. 
(Hmm..., oh well, I mean, only regarding their oxygen/carbondioxide 
transport function. hehe :) ) But the main reason the respirocytes 
would be much more effective, is that they can store gasses in pressure 
tanks at a 1000 bar. And such high pressures are only possible thanks 
to the high stiffness of their structure.

=====

>As for biological molecules, here is a bit about proteins: their 
>central structure depends on covalent bonds, with changing structures
<snip>

Yes, I know, but that's inside the "building block" ! 

But I was referring to how the building blocks are bonded to each other.

>We don't want to make our nanomachines strong and hard. We want to make 
>them so that they do what we want.

Yes, indeed. But I would guess, that more often than not, strong will 
be an advantage in engineering (ask an engineer).

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