Collagen represents the major structural protein found in the human body

self-assembling into the fiber with a repeating D-periodic gap/overlap spacing

is the main organic building block of many biological tissues in vivo. Collagen has been widely applied and researched in many scientific fields

such as materials science

biomedical

tissue engineering

biosensors and so on

mainly due to its characteristic biodegradability

high biocompatibility

non-toxic

low immunity compared with other biopolymers. In the last few years

collagen was found to self-assemble into the ordered supramolecular structures at appropriate conditions in vitro

which has received great attention of researchers

has been becoming a hot research. This review will focus on the self-assembly mechanism of collagen

the influence of external environmental conditions on the self-assembly of collagen and the self-assembly of collagen-based composite materials.