An important property of polyaniline (PANi), a polymer, is its electric conductivity. This makes it suitable for the manufacture of electrically conducting fibers. Consequently, PANi and other conductive polymers have been extensively studied for optical and electronic applications and many practical syntheses of one-dimensional (1D) nanostructured PANi have already been developed. However, preparation of water-soluble, conductive PANi nanowires with controllable morphologies and sizes, especially with good processibility, is still a big challenge. A possible solution could lie in the use of self-assembled proteins, such as plant viruses, as nanotemplates for the synthesis of these nanowires.
