(6ac) Shining Light on the Nervous System: From Biomaterials to Bioelectronics

Research Interests

Biomedical Devices, Biosensors, Soft Materials, Nanomaterials, Nanomedicine, Bioinspired Materials and Devices, Neuromodulation, Biomaterials and Drug Delivery, Neuroengineering, Tissue Engineering, Electrochemical Interfaces, Biocatalysis, Sustainability.

Postdoctoral Research Summary at Stanford University: Bioinspired Materials and Devices for Healthcare and Sustainability

Advisor: Yi Cui (Materials Science and Engineering and Chemistry), in a close collaboration with Zhenan Bao (Chemical Engineering), Jeffrey A. Reimer (Chair of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at UC Berkeley) and Friedrich Prinz (Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering), Stanford and Peter Ercius (National Center for Electron Microscopy, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory)

Postdoctoral Research Summary at Harvard Medical School and MIT: Shining Light on Pain Therapeutics: from Biomaterials to Smart Drug Delivery Systems

Advisor: Daniel Kohane (Boston Children's Hospital) and Robert Langer (Chemical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering)

PhD Dissertation: Nanowire Arrays Restore Vision in Blind Mice

Advisor: Gengfeng Zheng and Dongyuan Zhao (Department of Chemistry and Laboratory of Advanced Materials, Fudan) and in a close collaboration with Jiayi Zhang (Institutes of Brain Sciences at Fudan) and Wenlong Cheng (Chemical Engineering at Monash, Australia)

Research Experience

My academic training and research experience have provided me with a background in highly interdisciplinary area combing scientific disciplines including nanomaterial, bioelectronics, biomaterials, chemical engineering, tissue engineering, neuroengineering and biomedical engineering.

Dysfunctional neuronal signaling underlies a wide range of psychiatric and neurological disorders. Existing therapeutics often lack clinical efficacy to reverse signaling imbalance and are both non-specific and invasive. To improve treatments of brain-related diseases will require new tools and methods to map and to repair the brain with precision and biocompatibility. I am working at the interface of materials science, electronics and neuroscience with the goal of advancing understanding and treatment of disorders of the nervous system. I design, synthesize and fabricate pharmacological, optical, and electrical toolsets that manipulate and record neuronal activity and development. The dichotomy between advanced materials and brain has driven the curiosity of scientists to explore the wonders of the brain, as well as motivated the continued innovations of novel technologies based on advances in materials science and engineering to understand the brain. These results, along with a discussion of future neural interfaces, aim to improve our understanding of the nervous system and to inform new therapeutic approaches for bioelectronics.

• I developed a light triggered smart drug release device system. Current treatments of pain heavily rely on opioids, resulting in significant side effects such as addiction, tolerance, leading to the Opioid Overdose Crisis as we know of today. Smart drug delivery systems may provide an effective solution. Here I present the development of externally-triggerable drug delivery systems for on-demand, repeatable and adjustable local anesthesia using new polymer nanoparticles, where the timing, duration, and intensity of nerve block can be controlled through external energy triggers such as the optical tool. In addition to traditional pharmacological approaches, bioelectronic platforms to enhance our insights into the retina.
• I developed an artificial retina biomedical device. The restoration of light response with complex spatiotemporal features in retinal degenerative diseases towards retinal prosthesis has proven to be a considerable challenge over the past decades. Herein, inspired by the structure and function of photoreceptors in retinas, I develop artificial photoreceptors based on gold nanoparticle-decorated titania nanowire arrays, for restoration of visual responses in the blind mice with degenerated photoreceptors. Green, blue and near UV light responses in the retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) are restored with a spatial resolution better than 100 µm. ON responses in RGCs are blocked by glutamatergic antagonists, suggesting functional preservation of the remaining retinal circuits. Moreover, neurons in the primary visual cortex respond to light after subretinal implant of nanowire arrays. Improvement in pupillary light reflex suggests the behavioral recovery of light sensitivity. My study will shed light on the development of a new generation of optoelectronic toolkits for subretinal prosthetic devices. Through pharmacological, optical, and electrical toolsets, I aim to develop effective therapeutic solutions to neurological disease states. These results, along with a discussion of future neural interfaces, aim to improve our understanding of the nervous system and to inform new therapeutic approaches for biomaterials and bioelectronics.
• I developed bioinspired single-atom-based devices for mental health. Cortisol is a stress hormone from cholesterol in the two adrenal glands. It's significant for helping your body handle stressful situations, as your brain triggers its release in response to many different kinds of stress. however, when cortisol levels are too high for too long, this hormone can hurt you more than it helps. Here I generate atomically dispersed metal via photochemical reduction of metal acid solution using ultraviolet light. And then I emulate optimum natural systems following Murray’s law using a top-down approach. Such bio-inspired materials and devices, whose pore sizes decrease across multiple scales and finally terminate in size-invariant units like lung systems provide hierarchical branching and precise diameter ratios for connecting multi-scale pores from macro to micro levels. My Murray devices mimics enable highly enhanced mass exchange and transfer in liquid-solid, gas-solid and electrochemical reactions and exhibit enhanced performance in electrochemical interfaces. I introduce the integration of an electrochemical biosensing and a tailor-made bioinspired device, which acts as a stable and selective probing of the human stress hormone cortisol.

Research Proposal Experience

1. Shell Global, Shell Research and Engineering Grant (Yi Cui, Steven Chu), Bioinspired Materials and Devices for Sustainability, 2019-2021, Pending, Role: Written by me
2. R01GM073626-11, NIGMS, Prolonged Duration Local Anesthesia (Daniel Kohane) 2015.8.1-2019.4.30 Role: Main Participant
3. R01 GM116920 NIGMS, Nanoparticle-driven systems for tunable local pain relief (Daniel Kohane), 2016.4.27-2020.4.26, Role: Main Participant
4. Nanjing Leading Technology and Entrepreneurship Program, Photoelectrochemical Biosensor (Gengfeng Zheng), 2015-2019, Role: Written by me
5. Fudan, The Interdisciplinary Outstanding Doctoral Fellowship for PhD Thesis (Jing Tang), Carbon Quantum Materials for Drug Delivery and Bioimaging, 2012-2015, Role: PI
6. FDUROP Undergraduate Research Grant, Hui-Chun Chin and Tsung-Dao Lee Chinese Undergraduate Research Endowment, Wang-Dao Undergraduate Research Grant, Fudan Undergraduate Academic Research and Innovation Program, and Student's Academic Science and Technology Innovation Action Support Program. Furthermore, they got National Grand Prize winner of “Challenge Cup” national undergraduate academic science and technology event in China, 2012-2015, Role: Mentor
7. Dow Chemical Company, Dow chemical Innovation Fellowship for Sustainable Development (Jing Tang, Kun Jiang, Yongcheng Wang, Tao Jiang, Fei Wang, Jingjing Zhang), Functional Nanomaterials for Clean Energy, Awarded to only 2 teams for scientific innovation in sustainable biology and energy, 2014-2015, Role: MPI
8. BASF, BASF Outstanding Doctoral Fellowship (Jing Tang), Awarded to only one graduate student in Laboratory of Advanced Materials, Nanowire Nanosensor, 2013, Role: PI
9. The National Natural Science Foundation of China, Nanowire Functional Materials (Gengfeng Zheng), 2014.1-2016.12, Role: Main Participant
10. Ministry of Science and Technology, 973 Program, Rational Design of Functional Mesoporous Materials for Energy (Gengfeng Zheng, Dongyuan Zhao), 2013.1-2017.8, Role: Main Participant
11. Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, Nanowire Photoelectric Functional Materials (Gengfeng Zheng), 2012.1-2014.12, Role: Main Participant
12. Ministry of Education, Controllable synthesis of core-Shell Mesoporous Materials-Metal Oxide Nanowires and Their Applications in PEC Water Splitting (Gengfeng Zheng), 2013.1-2015.12, Role: Main Participant

Selective Awards & Honors

• Young Investigator Award in Northern California Chapter American Association of Physicists Symposium (2019)

• Winner of the 2018 NanoArt Image Contest, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (2018)
• Singapore Challenge, Global Young Scientists Summit (GYSS) @one-north, Singapore (2016)
• Outstanding Poster Award of Vision Forum (2017)
• Outstanding Shanghai Graduate Students on Graduation, Shanghai, China (2016)

• Baosteel’s Principal Scholarship, BAOWU STEEL GROUP (2015)

• First Prize of Unilever-The Royal Society of Chemistry Presentation Competition, Royal Society of Chemistry (2014)
• Grand Prize Winner of Dow Sustainability Innovation Student Challenge Award, Dow Chemical Company (2014)
• Kwang-Hua Scholarship, Kwang-Hua Education Foundation (2014)
• National Scholarship for Graduate Students, Chinese Government (2014)
• Representative of Universitas 21 (U21) Graduate Research Conference in New Zealand, Universitas 21 (2014)

• Distinguished Award of BASF Scholarship, BASF Corporation (2013)

Community Service and Leadship

• Safety Officer and Ordering, Yi Cui Group, Stanford University (2019-Present)
• Seminar Committee, Stanford Neurosciences Institute (2019-Present)
• Session Chair, Materials Research Society Fall Meeting (2018)
• Leader, Dow Sustainability Innovation Student Team (2014)
• Organizer and Host, Fudan Advanced Materials Laboratory Doctoral Forum (2014)
• Chair of the Academics, Research and Careers Committee, Fudan Advanced Materials Laboratory Students Council (2012-2015)
• Co-President, The Royal Society of Chemistry-Fudan University Students Association (2012-2015)
• President, Fudan Advanced Materials Laboratory Students Association (2012-2015)
• Volunteer, Shanghai World Expo (2010 Summer)
• Chair, Shanghai Municipal Government World Expo Command Volunteer Team (2010 Spring)

Teaching Interests:

I got the Teaching Certificate Program offered by Stanford in 2019. Aside from my research career, I also have extensive experience teaching at Fudan, Harvard and Stanford undergraduate students and graduate students. My teaching audiences have spanned middle school students to post-doctoral scholars. At Fudan, I have TAed undergraduate-level classes for the pre-medical students in General Chemistry and graduate level classes for chemical engineering student. At MIT and Stanford University, I have guest-lectured graduate-level chemical engineering classes. I have received positive feedbacks from both teaching experiences. I have been taken some Chemical Engineering and biomedical core classes in both undergraduate-level and graduate-level, thus I am willing to study and teach any existing classes, as well as design new classes. Last but not least, I mentored 4 undergraduate students and 4 graduate students in Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering at Fudan, Harvard and MIT, and they finally got very top university offers, such as Stanford, Princeton, UCSB and Boston University. Coming from a Chemical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering postdoc background at MIT and chemistry PhD background at Fudan, I am interested in teaching most of the major courses for Chemical Engineering, especially Molecular Thermodynamics, Biocatalysis, Transport Mechanics, Heat and Mass Transfer, Fluids Dynamics, and Thermodynamics, Separation Process. I am also interested in other courses including Material Science, Chemistry, Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, Neurotechnology, Biomaterials, Tissue Engineering and Electrochemistry, Soft Materials and Nanomedicine. These experiences have trained my ability to clearly explain difficult concepts in a simple or detailed manner. For six years of teaching and mentoring experience as a teaching fellow, creating a great educational experience for young scientists and researchers is critical for the continued advancement of science and it is with this view that I will approach teaching as a future faculty member.

Distinction (for Teaching and Mentoring)

• Outstanding Teaching Assistant for General Chemistry (Brand Courses Taught in English for Pre-Medical Students Overseas) (2015)

• Mentoring 4 undergraduate students (They succeeded in applying world-class graduate universities and completing several undergraduate research programs, including the Deng-Hui program, the Wang-Dao program, the Hui-Chun Chin & Tsung-Dao Lee Undergraduate Research Endowment and Student's Academic Science and Technology Innovation Action Support Program. Furthermore, they got National Grand Prize winner of “Challenge Cup” national undergraduate academic science and technology event)