Magnetic Nanocomposites and Their Incorporation into Higher Order Biosynthetic Functional Architectures.

A magnetically active FeO/poly(ethylene oxide)--poly(butadiene) (PEO--PBD) nanocomposite is formed by the encapsulation of magnetite nanoparticles with a short-chain amphiphilic block copolymer. This material is then incorporated into the self-assembly of higher order polymer architectures, along with an organic pigment, to yield biosynthetic, bifunctional optical and magnetically active FeO/bacteriochlorophyll /PEO--PBD polymeric chlorosomes.