Engineering Commons^™

Rational Design And Investigation Of Polypeptide Multilayer Films And Capsules, Ling Zhang

Doctoral Dissertations

Three major concerns in the science of materials today are control over structure and function at the molecular level, biodegradability, and scalability of production. Polymeric materials, notably polyelectrolyte multilayer films, have shown considerable promise in all these areas, and for rational development of multifunctionality. Polypeptides constitute an especially interesting class of polyelectrolyte, given their inherent biodegradability, means of control over structure, methods of large-scale synthesis, and ability to encode biological information. Relatively little is known, however, about polypeptide multilayer films, despite recent advances in the general area.

In this dissertation, ten heteropolypeptides were designed and synthesized by Fmoc chemistry. These …

Biomedical Applications Of Polypeptide Multilayer Nanofilms And Microcapsules, Jai Simha S. Rudra

Doctoral Dissertations

The past few years have witnessed considerable growth in synthetic polymer chemistry and physics, biomaterials science, and nano-scale engineering. Research on polypeptide multilayer films, coatings, and microcapsules is located at the intersection of these areas and are promising materials for applications in medicine, biotechnology, environmental science. Most envisioned applications of polypeptide multilayers have a biomedical bent. This dissertation on polypeptide multilayer film applications covers key points of polypeptides as materials, means of polymer production, film preparation, film characterization methods, and key points of current research in basic science. Both commercial and designed peptides have been used to fabricate films for …

Drug Loading And Release From Polypeptide Multilayer Nanofilms, Yang Zhong

Doctoral Dissertations

Polypeptides, linear macromolecules, are formed from amino acid residues by linkage of peptide bonds. Proteins are polypeptides too, with more complex conformations contributing to specific functionalities. Disulfide bonds are very important to maintain the structure and functions of proteins, which will form between two cysteine (Cys) residues under oxidizing circumstance.

Cys containing polypeptides are designed and synthesized by F-moc (9-Fluorenylmethyloxycarbonyl) chemistry. The number and position of Cys residues can be controlled by amino acid sequences design and following peptide synthesis, which is important to gain insights on the nature of polyelectrolyte multilayer film assembly and stability.

Both commercial and designed …