Synthetic Biology for High-Performance Materials

Title

Synthetic Biology for High-Performance Materials

Speaker

Prof. Fuzhong Zhang (Department of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering, Washington University in Saint Louis, USA)

Host

Prof. Kai Huang (GTIIT, Chemistry)

Time and Location

May. 20 2022, Friday, 11:00am-12:00pm(China Time),  E211 (Education Building, 2nd floor)

Language

English

Abstract

Manmade high-performance polymers are typically non-biodegradable and derived from petroleum feedstock through energy intensive processes involving toxic solvents and byproducts. Nature has evolved a wide range of high-performance protein-based materials, even outperform the best available petroleum-based alternatives. However, their natural biosynthetic processes are often impossible to harness for scalable production as they are produced in limited quantity by slow growing organisms. Engineering microbes to produce these high-performance materials could provide an attractive solution, but face multiple technical challenges. In this talk, I will introduce our recent work in developing synthetic biology strategies to microbially produce biodegradable, high-performance, tunable materials. These materials include silk-amyloid hybrid polymers that are stronger and tougher than natural spider silk fibers, synthetic muscle materials with high energy damping capability, and strong underwater adhesives that works on diverse surfaces.

Biography

Dr. Zhang is a full professor in the Department of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering, Washington University in St. Louis, USA. He received his bachelor degree at Peking University, master at McMaster University, Ph.D at University of Toronto, and postdoctoral training at UC Berkeley/Joint BioEnergy Institute. His research focuses on developing synthetic biology tools and systems for the sustainable production of chemicals and high-performance materials. His work has led to dozens of papers published in high impact journals, including Nature, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Chemical Biology, Nature Communications, and so on. He has received numerous awards, including the DARPA Young Faculty Award (2013), ORAU Junior Faculty Enhancement Award (2013), NSF CAREER Award (2014), Young Investigator Program from AFOSR, ONR, and HFSP (2015), NASA Early Career Faculty Award (2015), Biotech & Bioeng Daniel Wang Award (2016), Dean’s Faculty Award for Innovation in Research (2016), the SIMB Young Investigator Award (2017), and NIH Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (2019).