Fabrication of nanocomposites and hybrid materials using microbial biotemplates

Zhijun Shi1 & Xudian Shi1 & Muhammad Wajid Ullah1 & Sixiang Li1 & Victor V. Revin2 & Guang Yang1

Abstract
Microbes are important part of life that vary in sizes and shapes, diverse surface chemistry and biology, and porous nature of their
cell walls. Besides their importance in industrial processes such as fermentation, these serve as biotemplates and provide a
biomimetic approach for fabrication of multifarious complex constructs with predefined features, ordered composites and hybrid
nanomaterials, microdevices, and micro/nanorobots through various strategies. The template or building blocks for such approaches
can be bacterial, algal, and fungal cells or virus particles. Here, we have summarized recent advancements in
biofabrication based on live microbes. Using engineering approaches and suitable methods, live microbes can be manipulated
as functional Bmicro/nanodevices and -robots^ to further perform biological functions such as replication, distribution, motility,
formation of colonies, and secretion of metabolites at will. Biofabrication based on microbes provides effective methods to
control and manipulate microbes as functional live building blocks to create micro/nanodevices and -robots for biomedical and
energy applications.
Keywords Biofabrication . Microbes . Live building blocks . Artificial microbes . Synthetic biology