Mesoporous Calcite by Polymer Templating

Layered calcite crystals with internal 10−50 nm pores are precipitated from aqueous solution containing a polymer−peptide conjugate that aggregates into pore-forming templates. The zwitterionic peptide sequence behaves as the “binding block” of a double-hydrophilic block copolymer, facilitating templating, nucleation inhibition, and stabilization of amorphous precursor particles.