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Good News! Hangzhou Engineering Research Center for Smart Design and Manufacturing of Chemical Functional Materials of ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center was approved
2021-12-02
A list of Hangzhou Municipal Engineering Research Centers to be established in 2021 has been announced, and Hangzhou Engineering Research Center for Smart Design and Manufacturing of Chemical Functional Materials, mainly established by ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center, was approved as a municipal engineering research center. Organized scientific research to address “Bottleneck” problems!Chemical functional materials are the indispensable materials to support social economy, national defense and strategic emerging industries, and also the key to guarantee high-end manufacturing and industrial transformation. Therefore, its core technology has become the focus of competition among different nations. Organized scientific research to address “Bottleneck” problems!The 14th Five-Year Plan of Zhejiang Petrochemical Industry proposed to build high value-added industrial chains and improve the manufacturing of new chemical materials, specialty chemicals and traditional fine chemical industries. The newly-approved Hangzhou Engineering Research Center for smart Design and Manufacturing of Chemical Functional Materials aims at key common technical problems such as variable application scenarios and complex structure types of chemical functional materials. It is expected that the Research Center will tackle the “bottleneck” technological problems in petrochemicals, auxiliaries, dyestuffs and special polymers by exercising the interdisciplinary advantages of ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center, forming research teams and creating new research paradigms with some companies, e.g. Transfar Fine Chemicals and Chuanying New Material. The integration of “Industry-academia-research-application” leading the transformation and upgrading of industry!The integration of “Industry-academia-research-application” leading the transformation and upgrading of industry! The Engineering Research Center will build a hub connecting academic research and findings application, establish a pilot base linking laboratory research and factory production.Applying self-developed automation equipment and AI technology, the Engineering Research Center will research on precise and smart manufacturing of chemical functional materials, build an automated, high-throughput and smart technical system for the design and manufacturing of chemical functional materials, promote the leapfrog upgrading of green chemicals, precise synthesis and functional materials industries, and enhance the independent guarantee capability of the core industrial chain. Relying on Research Institute of Biological and Molecular Smart Manufacturing and led by Prof. Xing Huabin, President of the Institute, the Research Center has pooled a research team composed of some recipients of National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars. After making some breakthroughs in AI-driven automated high-throughput synthesis, smart design and green and efficient synthesis of functional chemicals, and smart construction and application of catalytic separation materials in the early stage, the team has been granted 2 national awards and over 120 patents. Besides, about 20 research achievements have been applied into industry. In the future, based on industrial needs, the Research Center will carry out innovative research, address common problems in key areas, and lead industrial transformation and upgrading.
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Congratulations to Prof. Chen Hongsheng on his being elected IEEE Fellow!
2021-11-29
On November 24, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) announced it list of new Fellows for 2022, and Prof. Chen Hongsheng from the Institute of Future Science, ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center was elected for his remarkable contributions to electromagnetic metamaterials and invisibility cloaks.Chen HongshengHe is a Distinguished Professor of “Cheung Kong Scholar’s Program”, the Ministry of Education, a recipients of National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars, and currently, head of the Innovative Research Laboratory of New Electromagnetic Structures and Quantum Electromagnetism at the Institute of Future Science of ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center. IEEE Fellow is the top ranking member of the IEEE, the highest honor conferred by the Institute. Recognized as an authoritative honor and an important professional achievement in the academic and scientific community, the Fellow is selected annually by peer experts among members who have made outstanding contributions, and the number of the Fellows does not exceed 0.1% of the total number of IEEE members.Prof. Chen Hongsheng’s achievements on new electromagnetic structures, meta-material, electromagnetic wave stealth, deep learning and intelligent electromagnetic wave modulation have been widely cited by academic journals at home and abroad. He has published over 260 papers in domestic and international journals, with the citations of tens of thousands of times, and in particular, his papers on new electromagnetic wave stealth and other fields have been listed as research highlights in Nature, Science, MIT Technology Review, etc. In 2020, Prof. Chen Hongsheng, together with his team, became one of the first batch of scientists to be stationed in the Center. Nowadays, most of the 30-plus members Prof. Chen Hongsheng’s team are promising young men born in 1980s and 1990s. A younger force is driving scientific and technological innovation forward in the Center!Team PhotoLaboratory Photo
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iGEM Gold Award by ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center
2021-11-26
International Genetically Engineered Machine Competition (iGEM) 2021 was concluded in the early morning of November 15, Beijing time. HiZJU-China, a team from ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center, took part in the Competition for the first time and won the gold medal among 352 teams worldwide. The team passed all the settings of the Competition with the best performance and won the highest appraisal from the panel of judging professors with its excellent experimental design, wonderful presentation of results and articulate defense.Genetic engineering helping degrade ethinyl estradiol (EE2)Social progress brought about various emerging pollutants impacting the environment and ecosystem worldwide, and 17α-ethinyl estradiol (EE2) is one of them. It is widely known that 17α-ethinyl estradiol (EE2), a typical endocrine interferent, is often used in contraceptive drugs, and the HiZJU-China team has found, through field research, that there is no effective degradation and detection method for the artificial estrogen EE2. The accumulation of these artificial estrogens in water not only caused the feminization of male fish, but endangered the balance of human endocrine system in several regions as well. In order to tackle EE2 pollution, the team members modified Escherichia Coli with genetic engineering to construct a co-metabolic pathway to degrade EE2 and ammonia nitrogen in wastewater, and, in an innovative way, achieved trace-level biochemical reaction detection with yeast two-hybrid technology, so the content of EE2 in water can be obtained by observing the cell color or fluorescence intensity.In addition, the project is also likely to degrade a variety of organic amine pollutants such as sulfonamides in wastewater. It is a useful exploration to degrade new pollutants and make contributions to the construction of ecological China.Interdisciplinary Integration! Solving practical problems with synthetic biology methodsYu Haoran, Lian Jiachang and Bao Zehua, from left to right The mentors of this award-winning team are the three young PIs: Yu Haoran, Lian Jiachang and Bao Zehua, from the Institute of Biological and Molecular Smart Manufacturing of the Center. The members are students of different majors, including bioengineering, electrical, accounting and industrial design. They showed excellent teamwork spirit with their individual strengths and exercised cooperation and innovation in experiments, modeling, research and defense, etc., and finally overcame the problems.Photo of the Team “Our team is very interdisciplinary, as future industrial development and scientific problem solving require interdisciplinary knowledge and expertise.”Mr. Lian Jiachang told us that the members, apart from doing research at the lab, conducted field research visits to sewage treatment plants, hospitals and other institutions to understand the bottlenecks of industries and practical needs of the society, and they even did artwork, designed web pages and animations to present scientific research results in the most lively way.Upgrading teaching with competitions and integrating industry and research. The young PIs said.We hope that the competition would give students an opportunity to apply what they have learned in synthetic biology into solving practical problems.Meanwhile, they also hope to, with the contests and competitions, open up the vision of the team, promote global exchange and cooperation, and strive to build ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center into a cradle for integrating sci-tech innovation and industrial innovation. News+International Genetically Engineered Machine Competition (iGEM), founded by MIT in 2003, developed into an international academic competition in 2005, and is currently the top international academic competition in the field of synthetic biology. Synthetic biology is an emerging field of research in recent years, and the research results of the competition teams each year have received widespread attention from journals such as Science, Nature, Scientific American, The Economist, and the related industry. As one of the top international sci-tech innovation events, iGEM is known as the “Olympics” of synthetic biology for university students. The students in applied biology, mathematics, computer science, art design, economics and management from MIT, Harvard, Princeton, UC Berkeley, Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University and other world-renowned universities competed on the same stage and explored the infinite possibilities of synthetic biology.
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‘’putting armor on biochar‘’ to promote biochar carbon sequestration potential in soils
2021-09-07
IntroductionGlobal warming is an important issue facing society today. Biochar carbon storage in soils is a potential natural-based solution for carbon sequestration. In recent years, Lehmann and others have repeatedly introduced and recommended this technology in Nature. In response to the large-scale implementation potential and feasibility of soil-biochar carbon sequestration proposed by him, the team of Academician Zhu Lizhong has been committed to systematic researches (i.e. key influencing factors, macro-scale biochar application scenarios, the overall potential of biochar carbon sequestration in farmland soil in China), which provide scientific basis to maximize the potential of biochar carbon sequestration in soil environment to promote the realization of carbon neutrality. Recently, they have revealed the mystery of biochar earth armor. Today, let us take a look at the mystery of the earth armor. Can it promote carbon storage?Figure 1 Scanning electron micrographs of fresh biochar and aged biocharThe fresh biochar exposed a wrinkled surface with cracks and channels (Figure 1a, Figure 1c and Figure 1e). In contrast, the aged biochar showed an observable covering on the surface (Figure 1b). In the image with large magnifications (500 times) (Figure 1f), the surface of aged biochar was observed to attach with a lot of fine particles, blocking the cracks and channels that were observed on the fresh biochar’s surface (Figure 1e). After the removal of the surface substances, both the fresh and aged biochar showed a surface with cracks and channels (Figure 1g and 1h).ⅡFigure 2 EDS images of the biochar’s surface elementsThe SEM-EDS results further indicated that the contents of Si, Al, Fe, and O elements on the surface of aged biochar were significantly increased, as compared to those on fresh biochar which means that the aged biochar was attached with soil minerals (e.g., SiO2). Moreover, the surface contents of soil mineral elements (Si, Al, and Fe) on the aged biochar were decreased after scraping the surface substances. ⅢFigure 3 Characterization of physicochemical properties of biochar(a) XRD pattern, (b) SSA, (c) FTIR spectra, and (d) Result of Oxidation experiment. (“Aged biochar*” was abbreviated for “Aged biochar with surface removed”).XRD results further supported the existence of certain minerals on the aged biochar. The surface area of the biochar after the field aging was significantly smaller than the fresh biochar (Figure 3b), consistent with the mineral accumulation of soil minerals on the surface of the biochar after the field aging, which blocked the cracks and channels (Figure1d, Figure 2 and Figure 3a). The discrepancy between the FTIR spectra of interior biochar and the surface substances indicated the high possibility of organo-mineral complexations, which had been widely reported. The oxidation test showed that the aged biochar with composite layer formed has a higher resistance to chemical oxidation than the fresh biochar. The chemical oxidation test indirectly proved that the soil minerals attached to the aged biochar can enhance the anti-chemical oxidation process of the biochar in the soil environment.ⅣFigure 4 Mechanical performance analysisThe results suggested the improvement of biochar particles’ mechanical strength after the field aging process, which would benefit the sequestration of particle internal structure and substances. The improvement of compressive strength of the aged biochar particles indicates that they might be able to withstand a higher mechanical pressure than the fresh biochar particles, leading to relative lower potential environmental risks, e.g., less fragmentation, less surface carbon loss, and more benefits for the microbial communities in the biochar particles.ⅤFigure 5 The impact of biochar on soil CO2 or N2O emissions (“Aged biochar*” was abbreviated for “Aged biochar without surface substances”)Fresh biochar had no significant impact on soil CO2 emissions, and significantly reduced soil accumulated N2O emissions; aged biochar further significantly reduced soil CO2 and N2O emissions (P<0.05); after scraping off the surface material of aged biochar, the soil CO2 emission reduction effect of aged biochar has disappeared while the soil N2O emission reduction effect was weakened. The results indicated that the surface material of the aged biochar (containing more organic-mineral complexes) played an important role in reducing soil CO2 and N2O emissions.ConclusionsThese results indicate that soil minerals could accumulate on the biochar during the field aging process, forming organo-mineral complexes, blocking the cracks and channels of the biochar, and improving its mechanical properties. The improved mechanical properties could inhibit the fragmentation of biochar particles, reducing the release of labile fractions from the biochar and the subsequent CO2 and N2O emissions. These findings also indicate that adjusting the mechanical properties of biochar particles to improve their physical stability before adding them into the soil, may be a potential way to better control the release of soil CO2 and N2O emissions.本文内容来自ELSEVIER旗舰期刊Sci Total Environ第782卷发表的论文:Wang, L., Gao, CC., Yang, K., Sheng, YQ., Xu, J., Zhao, YX., Lou, J., Sun, R., Zhu, LZ., 2021. Effects of biochar aging in the soil on its mechanical property and performance for soil CO2 and N2O emissions, Sci Total Environ 782, 146824. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.146824
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Progress in Tumor Treatment Achieved by SHEN Youqing’s Team from ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Published in Top Journals Again
2021-04-27
The latest global cancer burden data for 2020 released by the WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) show that there were 19.29 million new cancer cases worldwide in 2020, among which 4.57 million new cancer cases and 3 million cancer deaths happened in China. The numbers of new cancer cases and cancer mortality ranked the first in the world.Cancer has become a high incidence disease that seriously threatens human health with the advent of ageing society. How to treat tumors efficiently has become a topic of great social concern. Recently, Mr. SHEN Youqing's team from ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation has made new progress in tumor nanomedicine delivery vehicles and tumor immunotherapy, and the findings were published in Nature Biomedical Engineering and Nature Communications. I. Passing Game! Novel drug carriers break through “layers of tumor defense”The researchers of SHEN Youqing’s team said solid tumors are like a “sphere” wrapped up by layers of cells, and drugs will stop when they reach the vicinity of the sphere limited by traditional carriers, so it is difficult to break through the layers of cells and also difficult for drugs to penetrate into tumors.Mr. SHEN Youqing’s team developed a new type polymer-drug conjugate with cell membrane affinity, which can be bound to cells without adhering to proteins, and will effectively solve the problem mentioned above. This nanodrug, a polymeric OPDEA conjugated with phospholipids, is non-adhesive to proteins and can achieve nanodrug transcytosis by passing through different layers. After intravenous injection, it can circulate in the blood and maintain a dynamic balance between plasma and red blood cell surfaces, ultimately achieving efficient delivery of cancer drugs and improving therapeutic efficacy substantially.It is reported that researchers have been making remitting efforts to develop this nanodrug and the drug is of great significance in clinical translation. The findings will help design translational anti-cancer nanomedicines.The paper entitled “Enhanced tumour penetration and prolonged circulation in blood of polyzwitterion-drug conjugates with cell-membrane affinity” was published in Nature Biomedical Engineering online.II. New breakthroughs in tumor immunotherapyIf the new drug carrier is said to help tumor treatment by external force, immunotherapy is to improve the efficacy by modifying the body’s own cells and then being precisely targeted at tumor cells.It is understood that blocking PD-1/PD-L1 interactions with antibodies can restore human T cells to normal state and thus help tumor treatment. However, large-sized antibodies are often difficult to work well due to poor tumor penetration and other reasons.Mr. SHEN Youqing’s team discovered recently an efficient small immunotherapeutic molecule: 5-carboxy-8-hydroxyquinoline (IOX1), which can hinder the growth of solid tumors when combined with tumor chemotherapy drug adriamycin (DOX). The combination of liposomal IOX1 and DOX has shown it can eliminate various mouse cancer models and produce long-term immune memory. iOX1 inhibits the p-glycoprotein of cancer cells via the JMJD1A/β-catenin/P-gp pathway and enhances DOX-induced immunostimulatory immunogenic cell death significantly. iOX1 is likely to be a highly effective antibody-free chemotherapeutic immunotherapy.The finding entitled “Co-deliveryof IOX1 and doxorubicin for antibody-independent cancer chemo-immunotherapy” is published in Nature Communications online. Laboratory of Bio-Nano Engineering, ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological InnovationIt is reported that Mr. SHEN Youqing is leading the Bio-Nano Engineering Lab at ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation, which focuses on the creation and clinical translation of highly effective new-generation anti-tumor nanomedicines. The team has so far developed nanomedicine-related patents and technologies, which have been successfully transferred to pharmaceutical companies at 70 million in August and 20 million in September 2020; the team has applied for 2 invention patents and published several top papers after they entered ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation.
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Here come new polymer materials! A review of dynamic covalent polymer networks published in Chemical Reviews by the research team of ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center
2021-04-02
Synthetic polymers (plastics) have been playing an increasingly important role in the marketplace since the early 20th century, and they have been indispensable to industrial development. However, a series of environmental problems caused by plastic products have begun to attract more and more attention with the sustainable social development. Traditional polymer materials consist of thermoset and thermoplastic materials. Thermoset polymers (e.g. epoxy resin substrates, polyurethane foams.) have better dimensional stability and creep resistance than thermoplastic polymers and are therefore widely favored. However, it is also their chemical cross-linking that prevents thermoset polymers from being recycled and reproduced.How to dispose of plastic waste and reduce environmental pollution has become a headache.Is there a material that retains the advantages of thermoset plastics but can be reprocessed and recycled like thermoplastics? Dynamic covalent polymer networks (DCPN) offer a possibility, and they are beginning to challenge our understanding of traditional polymers.Recently, a paper entitled “Dynamic Covalent Polymer Networks: A Molecular Platform for Designing Functions beyond Chemical Recycling and Self-Healing” was published in Chemical Reviews, a top international review journal, with corresponding author of Prof. XIE Tao and first author Dr. ZHENG Ning from ZJU-Hangzhou Global Scientific and Technological Innovation Center. Dynamic covalent bonding is a class of chemical bonds that can realize reverse exchange under certain conditions (e.g., light, heat, humidity stimulation). The introduction of dynamic covalent bonds into polymers can form Dynamic Covalent Polymer Networks (DCPN), which have very different properties from traditional thermoplastic and thermoset polymers.In the last decade, DCPNs have made tremendous progress in new dynamic covalent chemistry, fundamental material concepts and emerging applications. The review focuses on four advances in Chemical Recycling, Self-Healing, Solid-State Plasticity, and Topological Transformation, highlighting the network structure design of functional materials and envisioning how DCPN complements traditional thermoplastic and thermoset polymers and how they shape the future together. The reuse and recycling of polymers have been under heated discussions nowadays as they play an important role in environmental protection and energy conservation, and DCPNs have attracted much attention for their unique role in chemical recycling and self-healing. The review summarizes the recent progress of DCPN in chemical recycling and self-healing, and provides insight into the nature of these two applications and the reasons why they have not yet been truly applied into industry from technical fields. In addition, DCPN possesses functional properties that traditional thermoplastic and thermoset polymers do not have. One of the most important properties is solid-state plasticity, i.e., the ability of a material to deform plastically in the solid state, thus changing its permanent shape and giving it new properties. DCPNs with solid-state plasticity have shown marvelous design versatility in deformation devices, artificial muscles, and micro and nano processing.The topology determines the properties of polymers, which in turn affects their application. The topology of polymers is generally pre-designed and is unchangeable after the material is synthesized to achieve desired properties unless they contain “active centers” that can be further polymerized (e.g., reactive polymerization). In contrast to conventional findings, the topology of polymer networks can be manipulated with dynamic bonding, facilitating easy post-programming of the topology. Since dynamic bonds can be activated repeatedly, proposed in this review is the concept of living network, which deems the DCPNs whose topology can be transformed can be regarded as living networks.This concept emphasizes the change of network topology after synthesis, including the steady evolution and growth of polymer networks. The review lists three types of topological transitions with different mechanisms: topological transitions with active chain growth, template-induced topological switching, and topological isomerization (Topological Isomerization), summarizing their distinctive features and advantages, and thus validating the concept of active networks.In conclusion, different from conventional thermoset and thermoplastic polymers, dynamic covalent polymers are a class of polymeric materials with unique properties that are expected to shed new light to human society together with conventional polymers in the future. The full paper is available at https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.chemrev.0c00938
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