De novo design of protein homo-oligomers with modular hydrogen-bond network–mediated specificity

Building with designed proteins General design principles for protein interaction specificity are challenging to extract. DNA nanotechnology, on the other hand, has harnessed the limited set of hydrogen-bonding interactions from Watson-Crick base-pairing to design and build a wide range of shapes. Protein-based materials have the potential for even greater geometric and chemical diversity, including additional functionality. Boyken et al. designed a class of protein oligomers that have interaction specificity determined by modular arrays of extensive hydrogen bond networks (see the Perspective by Netzer and Fleishman). They use the approach, which could one day become programmable, to build novel topologies with two concentric rings of helices. Science , this issue p. 680 ; see also p. 657