Overview
Research in the Velonia Group lies in the interface of chemistry, biomaterials and bionanotechnology. Our research involves synthesis and applications of biopolymers or sustainable polymers aimed to serve as biomaterials and address the needs of diverse applications. Special focus is given to protein-polymer conjugates, i.e. hybrid block copolymers synthesized to mimic natural superstructures. We study the molecular properties and assembling architectures observed in a variety of synthetic biopolymers together with their applications in diverse areas.
Protein-Polymer Conjugates
We focus on elucidating bioconjugation and providing easily accessible synthetic approaches.
Giant Amphiphiles
Design, synthesis and characterization of self-assembling bioblock-copolymers.
Synthetic Biopolymers
Synthesis of biopolymers with a focus on sustainable means or multifunctionality.
Applications
Drug delivery, nanoreactors and catalysis.
Concepts
The lines of our research and details of selected recent publications are given below.
Protein-polymer biohybrids
Modifying biomolecules with polymers provides us the means to integrate protein functionality with polymer material properties. Our focus is to simplify available synthetic means and improve the accessibility to tailored made protein-polymer functional conjugates. The most recent synthetic protocols involve:
Grafting to approaches via click bioconjugation reactions of proteins with presynthesized end-functionalized polymers,
Grafting from stategies employing reversible-deactivation radical polymerization (RDRP) approaches.
More details in:
In situ ATRP-Mediated hierarchical formation of giant amphiphile bionanoreactors
Formation of giant amphiphiles by post-functionalization of hydrophilic protein-polymer conjugates
Synthesis and single enzyme activity of a clicked lipase-BSA hetero-dimer
Giant Amphiphiles
Amphiphilic protein-polymer conjugates - Giant Amphiphiles - are designed to integrate protein functionality with polymer material properties and self-assembly.
Aiming to optimize their synthesis we developed a variety of approaches leading to amphiphilic biomacromolecules with high structure definition and studied the resulting supramolecular assemblies. We further introduced multifunctionality on the polymer moiety and demonstrated the ability to in situ form nanoreactors i.e. functional proteinosomes.
More details in:
In situ ATRP-Mediated hierarchical formation of giant amphiphile bionanoreactors
Formation of giant amphiphiles by post-functionalization of hydrophilic protein-polymer conjugates
Sustainable and Functional Polymers
We are involved in polymer and biopolymer synthesis aimed to provide sustainable solutions and/or assemblies with diverse biotechnological applications.Our efforts involve:
Synthesis of polymers forming nanoparticles aimed at biomedical applications,
Synthesis of biodegradable polymers with special focus on PLA and PHAs,
Production of PLA from food waste.
More details in:
Environmental Impact and Sustainability of Bioplastic Production from Food Waste
Synthesis and Modeling of Poly(L-lactic acid) via Polycondensation of L-Lactic Acid
Pilot-Scale Anaerobic Co-Digestion of Food Waste and Polylactic Acid
Applications
We are involved in studies focusing on biopolymer applications.
We study solution behavior of polymers and biopolymers expressing assembling and/or "smart"/responsive behavior in aqueous media. We are interested in the properties of compartmentalized nanostructures (micelles, vesicles, or gels) and their application in controlled drug delivery, tissue engineering and catalysis (our true love!).
More details in:
pH responsive biohybrid BSA-poly(DPA) nanoparticles for interlysosomal drug delivery
Chemical and Biophysical Signatures of the Protein Corona in Nanomedicine
Nanomaterials synthesis, an enabler of amyloidosis inhibition against human diseases
The team
spends the day doing ...
and ... chromatography, under conditions