(735a) Invited Talk: Rapid Prototyping of Biohybrid Nanostructures for Sensing and Responsive Materials

Enzymes, often thought of as only biological catalysts, are also exquisitely evolved, nanoscale logic gates. They can be regulated under single or multiple inputs and have a variety of selective outputs such as bond breaking, bond formation, and shape change. These can be advantageous for many sensing and responsive material applications. Interfacing with enzymes, the (bio)-logic of nature, for such advanced materials is one mission of my group. In this talk I will present our efforts to rapidly prototype enzymes and other proteins using scalable and robust cell free protein synthesis techniques[1, 2]. I will also cover methods of interfacing with hydrolytic enzymes in closed environments, namely optical transducers based on fluorescent single walled carbon nanotubes[3] and larger radio frequency based resonant structures[4]. Applications for these biohybrid nanostructures in agricultural and medical systems will be presented such as monitoring soil health and measuring hydrolytic activity in tumor micro-environments.

1. Dopp JL, Reuel NF (2018) Process optimization for scalable E. coli extract preparation for cell-free protein synthesis. Biochemical Engineering Journal, 138:21–28. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bej.2018.06.021
2. Dopp JL, Rothstein SM, Mansell TJ, Reuel NF (2019) Rapid prototyping of proteins: Mail order gene fragments to assayable proteins within 24 hours. Biotechnology and Bioengineering, 116(3):667–676. https://doi.org/10.1002/bit.26912
3. Kallmyer NE, Musielewicz J, Sutter J, Reuel NF (2018) Substrate-Wrapped, Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Probes for Hydrolytic Enzyme Characterization. Analytical Chemistry, 90(8):5209–5216. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.analchem.7b05444
4. Charkhabi S, Beierle AM, McDaniel MD, Reuel NF (2018) Resonant Sensors for Low-Cost, Contact-Free Measurement of Hydrolytic Enzyme Activity in Closed Systems. ACS Sensors, 3(8):1489–1498. https://doi.org/10.1021/acssensors.8b00267