Charm and Fascination of Dendrimer Nanotechnology in Biomedical Applications

Title: Charm and Fascination of Dendrimer Nanotechnology in Biomedical Applications

Speaker: Prof. Ling PENG

Centre Interdisciplinaire de Nanoscience de Marseille, CNRS

Aix-Marseille University, France

Time: Friday, 2015.4.17 am 10:30-11:30

Location:909-3403

 

Abstract: The application of nanotechnology to engineer nanovectors for drug delivery is widely expected to bring breakthrough in nanomedicine and create entirely novel therapeutics. Dendrimers are ideal nanocarriers for drug delivery by virtue of their uniquely well-defined and precisely controlled structure as well as the multivalent cooperativity confined within nanosized volume. We have established covalently constructed flexible dendrimers and self-assembled non-covalent supramolecular dendrimers as excellent nanocarriers for gene and drug delivery. In particular, self-assembling amphiphilic dendrimers are able to form adaptive supramolecular nanostructures, which encapsulate anticancer molecules with high loading efficiency for effective drug delivery to combat drug resistance. Our studies opens new perspectives in molecular engineering of functional dendrimers in nanotechnology and biomedical applications.

 

Introduction:Dr. Ling Peng is a research director at the French National Scientific Research Center (CNRS). She carried her undergraduate study in polymer chemistry with Prof. Chen Rongshi at Nanjing University in China, her Ph.D program in organic chemistry with Prof. Albert Eschenmoser at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich Switzerland, and her postdoctoral research with Prof. Maurice Goeldner in Pharmacy at Louis Pasteur University of Strasbourg in France. She was recruited as a research scientist in CNRS in 1997, and promoted as a CNRS research director in 2008. She is currently a group leader at the Interdisciplinary Center on Nanoscience in Marseille in France, and working actively in developing multifunctional dendrimers as intelligent nanomaterials for drug and gene delivery, molecular probes for exploring biological events and drug discovery. Dr. Ling Peng has been actively involved in the European COST Actions of “Biological Applications of Dendrimers” and “Targeting Drug Resistance of Cancer Stem Cells”, and coordinated a European project entitled “Dendrimers as nanovectors for targeted siRNA delivery in gene therapy”. She has co-authored more than 100 scientific papers, 5 patents and 13 book chapters. Dr. Ling Peng is the member of Editorial Advisory Board of Molecular Pharmaceutics, section editor for drug delivery of Current Medicinal Chemistry and Assistant Editor of New Journal of Chemistry.

 

Selected publications:

1. Laurent S, Chen H, Bedu S, Ziarelli F, Peng L, Zhang CC. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2005, 102, 9907-9912. (Cover Story)

2. Yu T, Liu X, Bolcato-Bellemin A-L, Wang Y, Liu C, Erbacher P, Qu F, Rocchi P, Behr J-P, Peng L. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2012, 51, 8478-8484. (Frontispiece)

3. Xia Y, Peng L. Chem. Rev. 2013, 113, 7880 – 7929 (Cover Story).

4. Liu X, Zhou J, Yu T, Chen C, Cheng Q, Sengupta K, Huang Y, Li H, Liu C, Wang Y, Posoco P, Wang M, Cui Q, Giorgio S, Fermeglia M, Qu F, Pricl S, Shi Y, Liang C, Rocchi P, Rossi JJ, Peng L. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2014,53, 11822-11827. (Highlighted in Nature Chemistry)

5. Wei T, Chen C, Liu J, Liu C, Posocco P, Liu X, Cheng Q, Huo S, Liang Z, Fermeglia M, Pricl S, Liang X-J, Rocchi P, Peng L. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 2015, 112, 2978.