Ring-Sheared Drop - Amyloid Fibril Formation

This campaign centered on four main objectives: (i) engineering the RSD to flight proven hardware, (ii) testing measurement and instrumentation methods aboard the ISS, (iii) studying protein kinetics under interfacial shear, and (iv) measuring and modeling protein solution rheology. The primary obective of this investigation is to quantify the effects of flow on fibrillization in the bulk and at interfaces, specifically at the air/water interface. This includes studying protein kinetics under interfacial shear, and measuring and modeling protein solution rheology. The overall objective is project to advance the mechanistic description of fibrillization by determining how shearing flow affects each of the stages of amyloid formation process − protein unfolding and nuclei formation, growth into protofibrils, and elongation and intertwining into mature fibrils and fibril growth − without any influence from solid boundaries.