Synthetic nacre by predesigned matrix-directed mineralization

Making nacre shine in the lab Many of the materials that animals use to make shells and skeletons are built with brittle or soft molecules. They owe their amazing mechanical properties to their layered construction, which is a challenge for synthetic fabrication. Pearly nacre, for example, has proved challenging to make owing to its complex structure of aragonite crystals in an organic matrix. Using an assembly-and-mineralization approach, Mao et al. have managed to fabricate nacre in the laboratory (see the Perspective by Barthelat). First, a layered, three-dimensional chitosan matrix is made, within which aragonite nanocrystals are precipitated from a solution containing calcium bicarbonate. Science , this issue p. 107 ; see also p. 32