All primary chemical bonds inherently weaken under increasing tension. Interestingly, nature is able to combine such bonds into protein complexes that accomplish the opposite behavior: they strengthen with increasing tensional force. These complexes known as catch bonds are increasingly considered a general feature in biological systems subjected to mechanical stress. Despite their prevalence in nature however, no truly synthetic realizations of catch bonds have been accomplished so far, as it is a profound challenge to synthetically mimic the allosteric mechanisms employed by protein catch bonds. In this work we propose a computational model that shows how a synthetic catch bond could be accomplished with the help of existing supramolecular motifs and mechanophores, each of which individually act as slip bonds. This model allows us to identify the limits of catch bonding in terms of a number of experimentally measurable parameters. This knowledge could be used to suggest potential molecular candidates, thereby providing a foothold in the ongoing pursuit to realize synthetic catch bonds.

随着张力的增加，所有主要的化学键都会固有地减弱。有趣的是，自然界能够将这些键结合成蛋白质复合物，从而完成相反的行为：它们随着张力的增加而增强。这些被称为捕捉键的络合物越来越多地被认为是遭受机械应力的生物系统的普遍特征。尽管它们在自然界中很盛行，但是到目前为止，还没有真正实现合成的捕获键，因为合成模拟蛋白捕获键所采用的变构机制是一个严峻的挑战。在这项工作中，我们提出了一个计算模型，该模型显示了如何利用现有的超分子基序和机制来完成合成的捕获键，它们各自分别充当滑键。该模型使我们能够根据许多实验可测量的参数来识别捕获键的极限。该知识可用于建议潜在的分子候选物，从而为实现合成捕获键的持续努力提供立足点。