Väitös (farmakologia, lääkekehitys ja lääkehoito): MEng Dawei Qi
Aika
28.5.2025 klo 10.00 - 13.00
MEng Dawei Qi esittää väitöskirjansa ”Interplay Between Dynamics of Polymeric Templates and Adaptive Synthesis of Species from Dynamic Combinatorial Libraries” julkisesti tarkastettavaksi Turun yliopistossa keskiviikkona 28.5.2025 klo 10.00 (Turun yliopisto, Dentalia, Arje Scheinin -sali, Lemminkäisenkatu 2, Turku).
Yleisön on mahdollista osallistua väitökseen myös etäyhteyden kautta: https://utu.zoom.us/j/8025508802 (kopioi linkki selaimeen).
Vastaväittäjänä toimii professori Heikki Tenhu (Helsingin yliopisto) ja kustoksena professori Sirpa Jalkanen (Turun yliopisto). Tilaisuus on englanninkielinen. Väitöksen alana on farmakologia, lääkekehitys ja lääkehoito.
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Tiivistelmä väitöstutkimuksesta:
All the natural living things, life, ecosystem, and even our planet, are built from molecules and chemical reactions. Dynamic combinatorial chemistry (DCC) explores how many reactions and molecules interact in a dynamic combinatorial library (DCL), products can reconfigure themselves in response to the environment—much like the natural living systems do.
My research introduces polymer dynamics into DCLs for the first time, drawing inspiration from dynamics of biopolymers such as proteins, DNA, and polysaccharides. Indeed, many life-like processes that were challenging to reproduce in chemistry had been delicately achieved.
In the first study, we demonstrated real-time structural adjustment of crosslinkers during single-chain polymer folding. This process mimics how molecular chaperones assist peptide folding and can be adapted to create drug-delivery carriers against drug-resistant cancer cells. This work opens a new path toward functional nanomaterials—such as nanomedicine, sensors, catalysts, and synthetic life-inspired systems.
The second study leverages entropy-driven configurational dynamics to produce unprecedented, high-configurational-entropy macrocycle–polymer assemblies, macrocycles bind to and slide along the polymer chain. Such assemblies echo the exceptional properties of high-entropy alloys/ceramics and the way proteins slide along DNA to ensure accurate transcription.
The final chapter addresses controlled fusion of cell-like polymersomes. Biological membrane fusion is vital to many cellular functions but is hard to replicate in synthetic systems because of strong electrostatic repulsion and limited structural complexity. By integrating dynamics from multiple polymer blocks within a DCL, we achieved polymersome fusion and uncovered the underlying mechanism.
Together, these studies show how adaptive polymer dynamics can direct molecule formation and assembly in real time, paving the way for smarter materials and life-like synthetic systems.
Yleisön on mahdollista osallistua väitökseen myös etäyhteyden kautta: https://utu.zoom.us/j/8025508802 (kopioi linkki selaimeen).
Vastaväittäjänä toimii professori Heikki Tenhu (Helsingin yliopisto) ja kustoksena professori Sirpa Jalkanen (Turun yliopisto). Tilaisuus on englanninkielinen. Väitöksen alana on farmakologia, lääkekehitys ja lääkehoito.
***
Tiivistelmä väitöstutkimuksesta:
All the natural living things, life, ecosystem, and even our planet, are built from molecules and chemical reactions. Dynamic combinatorial chemistry (DCC) explores how many reactions and molecules interact in a dynamic combinatorial library (DCL), products can reconfigure themselves in response to the environment—much like the natural living systems do.
My research introduces polymer dynamics into DCLs for the first time, drawing inspiration from dynamics of biopolymers such as proteins, DNA, and polysaccharides. Indeed, many life-like processes that were challenging to reproduce in chemistry had been delicately achieved.
In the first study, we demonstrated real-time structural adjustment of crosslinkers during single-chain polymer folding. This process mimics how molecular chaperones assist peptide folding and can be adapted to create drug-delivery carriers against drug-resistant cancer cells. This work opens a new path toward functional nanomaterials—such as nanomedicine, sensors, catalysts, and synthetic life-inspired systems.
The second study leverages entropy-driven configurational dynamics to produce unprecedented, high-configurational-entropy macrocycle–polymer assemblies, macrocycles bind to and slide along the polymer chain. Such assemblies echo the exceptional properties of high-entropy alloys/ceramics and the way proteins slide along DNA to ensure accurate transcription.
The final chapter addresses controlled fusion of cell-like polymersomes. Biological membrane fusion is vital to many cellular functions but is hard to replicate in synthetic systems because of strong electrostatic repulsion and limited structural complexity. By integrating dynamics from multiple polymer blocks within a DCL, we achieved polymersome fusion and uncovered the underlying mechanism.
Together, these studies show how adaptive polymer dynamics can direct molecule formation and assembly in real time, paving the way for smarter materials and life-like synthetic systems.
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