PME DISTINGUISHED COLLOQUIUM - Dr. Caroline M. Ajo-Franklin

Engineering Real-Time Sensors and Sustainable Materials for a Healthier Planet

We currently face rising global temperatures, dwindling natural resources, and increasing threats to human and ecological health. To help meet these challenges, my research group engineers biomolecules and microorganisms for real-time bioelectronic sensing and sustainable materials synthesis. We draw inspiration from how proteins and microorganisms transfer electrons to their environments and scaffold advanced materials. By leveraging these natural processes, we engineer microorganisms with specific capabilities to report on sensing through electron transfer and to create multifunctional living materials. In the first part of my presentation, I will describe how we programmed bacteria to grow into macroscopic materials with tunable mechanical properties. In the second part of my presentation, I will describe how we have engineered chimeric oxidoreductases for real-time bioelectronic monitoring of therapeutics in blood. Together, this work provides new concepts and insights for bioelectronics and biomaterials with emergent properties.

Hosted By: Prof. Mark Mimee, PME