Trilateral Online Symposium on “Bioinspired and Biobased Materials” is a one-day symposium organized by Kyoto Institute of Technology, and co-organized by Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy, and Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, India. Under world-wide critical condition, such as COVID-19 pandemic, Global Warming, etc, we, scientists are requested to contribute more actively to the international societies for solving global problems. To share state-of-the-art knowledge based on our research outcomes and to give opportunity to our colleagues and students for considering how we can contribute more actively to the international societies, we organize “Trilateral Symposium on Bioinspired and Biobased Materials”.

Dr. Tatjana Skrbic

“Building blocks of protein structure �C physics meets biology”

The native state structures of globular proteins are stable and well-packed indicating that self interactions are favored over protein-solvent interactions under folding conditions. We use this as a guiding principle to derive the geometry of the building blocks of protein structures �C alpha helices and strands assembled into beta-sheets �C with no adjustable parameters, no amino acid sequence information, and no chemistry. There is an almost perfect fit between the dictates of mathematics and physics and the rules of quantum chemistry. Our theory establishes an energy landscape that channels protein evolution by providing sequence-independent platforms for elaborating sequence-dependent functional diversity. Our work highlights the vital role of discreteness in life with implications for the creation of artificial life and on the nature of life elsewhere in the cosmos.

Assoc. Prof.
Tomonari Tanaka

“Protecting-group-free Synthesis of Glycopolymers in Water and Their Binding Affinity with Glycoreceptors”

Glycopolymers consisting of a synthetic polymer backbone with pendant saccharide moieties have attracted much attention as functional polymers such as biomaterials and biomimetic materials. Typical synthetic methods require multi-step processes for glycopolymers from unprotected sugars, including the protection and deprotection of the hydroxy groups on the saccharide. We recently developed facile methods for the synthesis of glycopolymers without the use of protecting-groups in aqueous media. The glycopolymers exhibited strong and specific interactions with the corresponding glycoreceptors such as lectins and virus proteins due to the multivalency of the saccharide moieties in the glycopolymers; that is called the glycocluster effect.

Prof. Achille Giacometti

“Can a protein fold in a non-aqueous solvent?”

Proteins are formidable molecular machines of life. Under physiological conditions, they adopt their native conformation spontaneously and reproducibly, have a myriad of degrees of freedom and are stabilized by thousands of interactions both intra-molecular and with water. In this talk I will then ask the following question: is there a liquid, different from water, in which polypeptide chains fold by burying the polar amino acids and still possessing the ordered secondary structure elements? Clearly, non-polar solvents, such as cyclohexane for instance, appear to be optimal candidates for this, thus suggesting the two processes to be mirror images of one another. To address this problem, I will then review the concept of hydrophobic effect that is believed to be one of the main driving forces to the folding of a protein and discuss the unique role of water as a solvent. Here I will argue that the definition of polar and non-polar solvent can only be given by a proper use of thermodynamics and failing to do so is also the origin of a large number of hydrophobicity scales that do not agree with one another. The final outcome of this analysis is that the answer to the above questions appears to be negative.

Prof. Flavio Romano

“Exploiting species number in DNA self-assembly”

One of the fundamental goals of nanotechnology is to exploit selective and directional interactions between molecules to design particles that self-assemble into target structures, from capsids, to nanoclusters, to fully formed crystals with target properties (e.g., optical, mechanical, etc.). Here, we provide a general framework which transforms the inverse problem of self-assembly of colloidal crystals into a Boolean satisfiability problem for which solutions can be found numerically. Given a reference structure and the desired number of components, our approach produces designs for which the target structure is an energy minimum, and also allows us to exclude solutions that correspond to competing structures. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach by designing model particles that spontaneously nucleate milestone structures such as the cubic diamond, the pyrochlore, and the clathrate lattices.

Asst. Prof.
Huaizhong Xu

“Melt Electrospinning to Melt Electrowriting”

Electrospinning is a widely-used nanotechnology currently, while researchers pay more attention to solution electrospinning comparing to melt electrospinning due to the micro-scale fiber diameter and the complex device construct of melt electrospinning. Although melt electrowriting (MEW) belongs to melt electrospinning, it shows significant power to fabricate complex tissue engineering scaffold. Herein, the MEW devices, applied polymers, printed patterns, as well as the tendency of the MEW technology will be introduced. Meanwhile, the current work of MEW in XU��s lab will be introduced as well.

Assoc. Prof. Yuji Aso

“Screening of fungi producing itaconic acid derivatives and its application to development of new biobased polyvinyls”

Itaconic acid (IA) possessing a terminal alkene is a bio-vinyl compound produced by fungi, Because of its unique structure, IA is used worldwide for manufacturing materials such as biobased plastics. Therefore, isolation of a more suitable and high-titer IA and its derivatives producers from nature is desired. This presentation reviews my recent studies concerning a novel structure-based microbial screening method for vinyl compound discovery, DISCOVER (direct screening method based on coupling reactions for vinyl compound producers), and synthesis of new biobased polyvinyls consisting of an IA derivative, 10-hydroxyhexylitaconic acid, produced by a fungus screened by DISCOVER.

Prof. Vimal Katiyar

“Sustainable Polymers for High End Applications”

This presentation highlights the use of available bio-resources for value added sustainable polymeric products for Engineering, Commodity and Biomadical Applications. Among the available bio-based plastics, polylactic acid (PLA), poly (caprolactone), Polyhydroxyalkanoates, have made its own place due to its biodegradability and have a potential to replace some of the conventional fossil based plastics. It is noteworthy to mention that properties such as melting point, stiffness, heat stability temperature and gas barrier properties limit its use in high temperature commodity and engineering applications. In relation with PLA, such limitations is overcome by developing new class of high molecular weight stereocomplex PLA (sc-PLA). In this talk, fabrication strategies for synthesis of stereocomplex-PLA-bionanocomposites and evaluation of their properties along with possible applications will be discussed. This talk will also focus on fabrication of bionano-fillers, processing of bionanocomposites caste films, injection molded products and 3D printing for biomedical and also its uses in energy applications.