Lectures and seminars Seminar: "Hybrid, functional nanomaterials that integrate proteins/peptides and DNA"

12-12-2024 3:00 pm - 4:30 pm Add to iCal
Campus Solna Biomedicum, D1012, Karolinska Institutet Solna

Welcome to a seminar with Nicholas Stephanopoulos from Arizona State University.

About the talk

The ability to design materials that mimic the complexity and functionality of biological systems is a long standing goal of nanotechnology, with applications in medicine, energy, and fundamental science. Biological molecules such as proteins, peptides, and DNA possess a rich palette of self-assembly motifs and chemical functional diversity, and are attractive building blocks for the synthesis of such nanomaterials. In this talk, we will describe research in creating hybrid materials that incorporate proteins and peptides with DNA nanotechnology to create cages, nanofibers, and synthetic antibodies with a high degree of programmability and nanoscale resolution. Key to these endeavors will be (bio)molecular design, organic chemistry for linking components in a site-specific fashion, and the tuning of multiple self-assembly "modes" to create hybrid structures. We will also outline some exciting future directions, like DNA “nano-assemblers” for building asymmetric protein nanostructures. Although the talk will focus on the fundamental chemistry and self-assembly of these systems, we will also discuss potential applications in areas such as targeted cargo delivery, biomaterials for regenerative medicine, and synthesis of virus- and antibody-mimetic nanostructures.

Host

Professor Björn Högberg, Department of Medical BIochemistry and Biophysics, KI