For our work contributions to the field of supramolecular chemistry, Job Boekhoven received the VCI – Dozentenpreis on the 11th of November 2021. The FCI’s Dozentenpreis is awarded to “exceptionally well qualified young researchers”.
In biology, self-assembly of proteins and energy-consuming reaction cycles are intricately coupled. Recently, synthetic analogs of chemically fueled assemblies have emerged, but examples in which assembly and reaction cycles are reciprocally coupled remain rare. We report a peptide that can be activated and deactivated for self-assembly. The emerging assemblies change the microenvironment of their building blocks, which consequently accelerate the rates of building block deactivation and reactivation. We quantitatively understand the mechanisms at play, and we are thus able to tune the catalysis by molecular design of the peptide precursor. Continue reading here:
We present a model for membrane-less organelles based on RNA-containing active coacervate droplets regulated by a fuel-driven reaction cycle. These droplets emerge when fuel is present, but decay without. Moreover, we find these droplets can transiently up-concentrate functional RNA which remains in its active folded state inside the droplets. Finally, we show that in their pathway towards decay, these droplets break apart in multiple droplet fragments. Emergence, decay, rapid exchange of building blocks, and functionality are all hallmarks of membrane-less organelles, and we believe that our work could be powerful as a model to study such organelles. Check it our here:
Kun’s work offers design rules to drive peptide self-assembly regulated by a fuel-driven reaction cycle. We demonstrate that, by altering the ratio of attractive to repulsive interactions between peptides, the behavior can be toggled between no assembly, fuel-driven dissipative self-assembly, and a state in which the system is permanently assembled. Check out the work here:
The starting grant “ActiDrops” has been granted by the European Research Council. The grant awards us €1.5 million for a period of 5 years for the ‘Synthetic Active Droplets Inspired by Life’ project.
Tabea Huss joins the group for a B.Sc. internship and will be working with Patrick on systems chemistry out of equilibrium.
Christine Kriebisch will work with Caren on her M.Sc. internship on drug delivery.
Brigitte Kriebisch will work with Carsten on complex coacervates.
All the way from Canada, Yuning and Michelle join the group for a research stay. Welcome!
Sebastian Auffarth joins the group for his M.Sc. thesis. He’ll be working with Raphael on the active self-assembly of Silicon Nanocrystals.
Raphael and Arzu’s paper of dissipative dynamic self-assembly of nanoparticles and their uptake by cells got published in Angewandte Chemie.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/anie.201807937
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/cnma.201800169
Supramolecular materials are materials in which molecular building blocks are held together by non‐covalent interactions. These materials exist in equilibrium with their environment. In contrast, most biological materials exist out of equilibrium. They require constant dissipation of energy and consumption of nutrients to be sustained. As a result of their non‐equilibrium nature, biological materials have superior properties compared to their in‐equilibrium counterparts. These properties include spatial and temporal control over their presence, the ability to self‐heal and even the ability to self‐replicate. Inspired by biology, researchers have developed analogs of such dissipative supramolecular materials. This Focus Review introduces the crucial differences between in‐equilibrium and dissipative supramolecular materials. We focus on one unique property of the emerging materials: their tunable lifetime. With recent examples, we show the principles involved and how these materials can be applied in the future.
The objective of the research of the cross-regional Collaborative Research Center The Origins of Life: Investigating Mechanisms with Interdisciplinary Experiments (“Lebensentstehung: Erkundung von Mechanismen mit interdisziplinären Experimenten”) is to perform laboratory tests on various hypotheses about the origins of life. This is made possible by close collaboration among scientists in Astronomy, Biology, Chemistry, Geosciences and Physics.
The coordinator is Prof. Dieter Braun (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München); other collaboration partners are the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching, the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry in Martinsried and the German Research Center for Environmental Health (Helmholtz Zentrum München), the University of Stuttgart and Heidelberg University.
Benedikt and Caren’s paper on “Dissipative assemblies that inhibit their deactivation” is published in Soft Matter.
Raphael’s book chapter on the “Unique properties of supramolecular biomaterials through nonequilibrium self-assembly” published in “Self-assembling Biomaterials”
Patrick Schwarz and Erika Keil, both from TUM, join the group for their M.Sc. and B.Sc. thesis (resp.). Welcome!
Simon Rydzek (TUM) is joining us for an internship and Chris Robidillo (Alberta U.) is joining us for a three months research stay.
Welcome!
Our recent work on supramolecular materials with a time switch has been highlighted by Chemistry Worlds, Scence Daily and others. Find the articles here:
M. Tena-Solsona,* B. Rieß,* R. Grötsch , F. Löhrer, C. Wanzke, B. Käsdorf, A. Bausch, P. Mueller-Buschbaum, O. Lieleg, J. Boekhoven
“Non-equilibrium dissipative supramolecular materials with a tunable lifetime”
Nature Commun.
Highlights:
“Self-destructing material mimics nature“, Chemistry World
“Supramolecular materials with a time switch“, TUM News
“Self-disposing supramolecular materials with a tunable lifetime“, Science Daily
“Materialien, die sich selbst entsorgen“, Chemie.de
We’ve developed materials with a time switch.
The design principle is simple and generic. The simplicity allowed us to build it into all kinds of materials. For instance, we’ve demonstrated it works for tiny colloids (no larger than 1/100th the diameter of a human hair) that abolish themselves after a predetermined lifetime. The colloids could be used as a vehicle that releases drugs over prolonged time and exactly when needed.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUMrtZT0uaQ[/embedyt]
We also showed the design principles could be applied to inks. The self-erasing inks could find application as a temporary top-secret message carrier. More down-to-earth would be an application as a reusable paper, that self-erases overnight, leaving you with a fresh sheet of scrap paper every morning.
The paper can be found here: http://rdcu.be/uiAj
A highlight of the work can be found here: https://lnkd.in/gV4_Qni
