Inducing nonlinear conductance and emergent memristance in open pores using blockers

) responses, which, in some instances, give rise to memristive behavior. We find that the interaction of ampicillin and spermine with OmpF at the tested conditions was insufficient to produce nonlinearity or memristance. However, interaction between arginine polypeptides and OmpF leads to length and charge-dependent nonlinear conductance with emergent memristance in the case of arginine nonapeptide. Molecular dynamics simulations showed that arginine pentapeptides (Arg-5) block the pore longitudinally as a stretched chain whereas bulkier and highly charged arginine nonapeptides (Arg-9) block the pore transversally by compaction of the peptide chain. Although both blocking conformations were sufficient to exhibit nonlinear dynamics, only the transversal blocking conformation led to emergent memristance, likely due to longer-lived interactions between binding sites and the Arg-9.