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Our Research Projects

Recently, a breakthrough in developing artificial Light Harvesting Complexes (LHCs) has been achieved through combining the self-organization tendency of surfactants with the unique property of J-aggregating organic dyes having coherent exciton migration similar to the natural LHCs. Depending on the chemical structure, the presence of additives or the conditions of sample preparation the amphiphilic dye aggregates show different packing motifs. Correlating the optical properties of the ...

Special amphiphilic calixarene and fullerene derivatives with Newkome-type dendrimeric headgroups or amphiphilic non-ionic polyglycerol derivatives possess a unique capacity to form structurally persistent micellar assemblies. In cooperation with the groups of Prof. A. Hirsch (Institute of Organic Chemistry at the Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg) and the group of Prof. R. Haag (Institute of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the Freie Universität Berlin) we study the molecular factors which ...

The formation of insoluble amyloid deposits by protein fibrillogenesis is a common hallmark of many neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease. In cooperation with Prof. B. Koksch (Institute of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the Freie Universität Berlin) simple peptide systems are structurally characterized which are designed to model the conformational transition that is responsible for the formation of amyloids. Cooperation with Prof. B. Koksch (FU Berlin) ...

Self-assembly of synthetic amphiphilic polymers in water leads to a fascinating wealth of structures, many of which show analogies and similarities to the structures found in cells and cell organelles. Inspired by their biological "prototypes" strategies for preparing multicompartment micelles by using ternary block copolymers have been explored by the group of Prof. A. Laschewsky (Institute of Chemistry at the Universität Potsdam). Cryo-TEM and cryo-tomography allows for the direct ...

In cooperation with Prof. S. Sharma (Department of Chemistry at the University of Delhi, India) and Prof. R. Haag (FU Berlin) we pursue the linear attachment of structure enforcing dendrons to a polymeric backbone, which strongly influence the backfolding of the polymeric chain. The steric situation affect the overall structure in a way that is different from monomeric dendritic amphiphiles. In the project the size of the dendrons, the degree of branching and the additional influence of alkyl ...

In cooperation with Prof. Andreas Hermann (Humboldt Universität zu Berlin) we study the inhibition of influenza A virus fusion with target membranes by multivalent binding of highly functionalised nanoparticles to the fusion mediating virus protein hemagglutinin. Such particles should provide the basis for studies on multivalent amplification of inhibitory effects. For this purpose, gold nanoparticles covered with differently structured ligands are developed in the group of Prof. Rainer Haag ...