Molecular Machines Group Launch | James Cooper, University of Reading
12:17PM Jan 23, +0000
Speakers:
Keywords:
molecular machines
systems
group
molecules
foresight
molecular
materials
interested
machine
challenges
single molecule
focused
mechanical
question
design
synthetic
switches
meeting
year
idea
Hello, Hi, everyone. Oh, it's so good.
Hello.
Hi. Hello.
Oh, it's very good to see so many of you. Fantastic. Okay, um,
hello, Melissa. Oh, hi.
Oh, it's really we have a lot of fun. How are you doing? I'm great. I'm great. I cannot wait for this group to start. And I'm very, very humbled to have so many of all of you here. So thank you very much for joining. It's really sweet. And we have a lot of people here actually, that met now. It's already two years ago, and edge started last conference that he did with foresight. So it's really nice to see a few folks from there as well. And with James, you're here as well, correct? Yes. Okay. Just making sure you co host as well, in case anything falls apart in my case, then you should.
We've had it because I've done a while I'm doing
well, luckily, we have now over 30 people who are very competent on this call who I think would have a fantastic time, even if we weren't here. I think we can't be can go wrong too much. All right. I'm admitting a few more people. While this has meant more people than I expected really. And. And well, that's, that's amazing. I can't wait until we get into into the introduction hear from all of you. How would you want this group to accomplish this year, I'm going to get started pretty on time to make sure that we have as much time as possible afterwards for all of you talking because I figured that people can watch my introduction later in case in case they want to. But okay, it's make the most of this time that we all have here together. And so I'm Allison Duettmann, welcome in case, some of you may not know me, I'm foresights. President, and I'm the coordinator of this group. So that means any questions that are related to what am I doing here? Can you help me schedule, I can't find this and that. And those are, please direct it to me. And I think James will be doing much more of the content facing stuff. So how did this group come about? Well, it was generated, usually, we have once or twice a year of technical competitions by which we bring a lot of you actually together into the same room for two days to try to really push the envelope in what molecular machines can do, or to try to use advancements towards nanotechnology to solve problems in medicine and energy. And then usually, the proposals that come out of this after those two days of competitions are amazing. But then people go back into their silos. And so now the virtual, I think, really gives us this, you know, unique opportunity to create more long term collaboration around really kind of bold ideas, and both progress. And so this is an invitation from me to you to make the most of this kind of like rare opportunity, I guess, that we've been given off the virtual because, frankly, we could never hope to assemble so many of you on a regular basis if we were meeting in person. So this is, I think, a really precious thing that we that we can make the most of. And so I welcome you to lean in, please fill out the participation form that we will send out, I will post it again in the chat in a second. And try to really make the most of this and try to kind of like, consider this as your team of, well, how many do we have on here now 46 already. Overall, I think we're over 70 in the group. So consider this team for one year. And let's try to make the most of this. Another invitation that I have is please try to think bolt, right. So rather than focusing on only state of the art, try to really reach for the ideas that are pushing the envelope that are really just on the edge of the Overton window. And you know, this, those efforts that could come out of this group may be larger than one person may be larger than one group, and may even require a coalition of industry folks working in academia, and even potential governmental agencies. It's going that I really am making the most of this and and, and we actually do have a few funders here. So let's take this as an opportunity to create programs that are as big and impressive as bold, that it would actually be that they would deserve a new funding structure around them. So this is just a little bit of my kind of like prompting of like, let's think outside of the box. And I think this is enough of my end for now. I will hand it over to James Cooper. James is the chair of this group. He's a 20 21% fellow and he will tell you a little bit more about the program. And I will be in the chat. I'll be monitoring your questions. And please feel free to reach out to me at any point in time if I can help and I cannot wait to see much more of you if only virtual for now. Or James welcome. So I'll
start sharing my screen then, I presume?
Sounds great.
So I presume you can see that. It says, Oh, god, yes. There we go. Yeah, I haven't. Like I said, I haven't, I haven't done a zoom anything, since I did my job interview in May. So no fun. Anyway, it's really fantastic to have everyone here today. And my job as chair of this group is originally to impart bring everyone together. And then it's also to introduce you to what this group is, is about, in part, some of the challenges that I foresee that we could we could be tackling and yet totally what the group's about. So the the talk today really was, what does the future hold for molecular machines, which I think for many of us often becomes an answer of just what we're not really sure. And this is my sort of personal reflections on that. And before I get into that, I do think it's important to discuss what the foresight Institute actually is the many, many people in this group that have interacted with foresight before. But there are a lot of people that we've invited, who may be interacting with your site for the first time. And I think we think it's really important that you get an idea of what foresight is all about. So I paraphrase something from foresights website, that I think encapsulates what this institute really does. And it's seeking seeks to create a community to promote the beneficial and considered use of nanotechnology. And then my addition was to drive future advances in this area. And so every year foresight awards to fame and prizes for nanotechnology in experimental and theoretical aspects of this, we have nine previous winners of this prize as participants in this group. And that's one of the reasons like so would have foresight sort of drives interest, it sort of has these these prizes that are sort of a big showcase for finance technology. And then in addition to that, foresight, fellowships are awarded every year support, in particular early career researchers. And so there are six foresight fellows this year, as as mentioned, I am one of those, and will be introduced to all of these people after my talks finished. So, Allison mentioned how four sites every year holds an annual technical competition. And this has focused on four sites main interests of nanotechnology, biotechnology and computation. So the meeting that I went to now two years ago in 2019, in Evanston, which is the one Allison mentioned, that was hosted by Fraser startup, and Melissa de Martin, who's also here was on contemporary material science, how can molecular machines help. And these meetings are designed to bring leaders in these fields together to discuss their current challenges, goals, bottlenecks, and their possible collaborations, as the opportunities are mentioned, to interact with funders, people can start to brainstorm competitive proposals. And there's the idea of interdisciplinary skill sharing, which I think is something that a lot of us appreciate, but sometimes maybe aren't particularly good doing. And ultimately, one of the main goals is to generate new research ideas and proposals and things that actually could be potentially fundable.
So then the question becomes, why are we all here? And how will this program work in 2021, so as most of us noticed, 2020 was a little different than usual. I've put usual in inverted commas, because of course, usual means very different things to to all of us. And I think a lot of us anticipate that 2020 will work in a similar way. And that means that foresight moved its program online. So this one annual competition was replaced with these monthly meetings. So we're kicking off the 2021 program today. There'll be meetings every month, throughout the year. And that offers new way to approach how foresight in the group interacts and maybe allows for more prolonged discussion about what we do. On the third Thursday of every month, we'll have two to three leaders in the field will each give an approximate 20 minute presentation based on the work that they're they're doing. And the final five minutes of these talks are supposed to be focused on forward looking goals and challenges. So the remaining 15 minutes can be about whatever the speakers want them to be about. But the final five minutes should really be focused on the real big challenges in the areas that the speakers identify. And that's supposed to stimulate discussion in the group and getting us thinking about what these really big challenges are. And so each meeting apart from the ones where there are three speakers tended to be about an hour so there'll be 10 minutes of questions and discussion relates to the group's answers to the questionnaire that you've all been asked to fill out. They'll be informal discussion and gather. And then in addition, we'll have some focus workshops and things that are focusing on funding and collaborative projects and will start bringing things to him together towards maybe accelerated programs. Later on in the year. The first half of the year is really focused on the presentations and getting everyone on To speed and where the field stands and where people think that it might be going. So I should also talk a little bit about who I am, because several of you may have only interacted with me over email. One of the things that's important is while we have this questionnaire that we sent out to all of you, it's really to help the group interact with itself. People can discuss what skills they have, you know what skills they're looking for. And that's often how a foresight meeting tends to work. People talk about what they're good at what they're looking for, things they're really interested in, and stuff like that. And this questionnaire will help us get a gauge of that helps you introduce yourselves to each other outside of our sort of informal gatherings that we have. So we'd encourage you very strongly to fill all of that out. So you have actually seen me but for people coming in late, this is a picture of what it looked like. I'm Dr. James Arthur Cooper. I'm a lecturer in organic chemistry in the in the UK at the University of Reading, I got my position last September. I'm 2021 foresight fellow in transmembrane, molecular nanotechnology, which is a nutshell well describing what I'm really interested in. So the work that I do is focused on membrane bound stimuli responsive assemblies, my interests are coupling stimuli responsive assemblies and molecular networks with compartmentalised architectures. My skills, I would say, my main ones are transmembrane, ion transport and a very general term of supernatural chemistry. And then what I'm looking for here is I'm looking for new collaborations, I've got an idea that may require some palomas own expertise. So people that have interests in the area I'm definitely keen to speak to. And I'm also looking for funding opportunities and advice as a early career academic. So that's an idea like a blueprint of how you could fill out some aspects of those the questionnaire that you've been given, just in case you're not quite sure, what's expected.
So this introductory talk, as well as me talking about what the group is about, it's meant to help. It's intended to help have initiate some discussion to what we think molecular machines are and how we can advance research in, in this field. So when people ask, you know, what is the molecular machine I remember, I asked this, when we had our informal gather meeting in December, you get a huge number of different responses, things like directed molecular motion, forming work, switches and motors, some people believe fall into that category out of equilibrium states computing molecules that make molecules or assemblers, molecular manufacturing and machine like behavior and moving cargoes around. But I do think a lot of us really associate with biological molecular machines as our inspiration for why a lot of us are in this field. So you have things just ATP synthase, that I have here on the with the top left, as you look at it, I'm looking at my screen, I should be able to work that out for myself, no DNA polymerase things are the rhizome. All these objects exhibit some of the functions and characteristics that I showed in the previous slide. Now they they perform work their processes, they may maybe display motion that's linear, or rotary. And so these are real inspirations for why we're in this field. And so when I started to think about what are the future challenges for molecular machines, I sort of broke it down into how I would imagine if I was taking this as a massive research program, what I would be doing, and of course, really, the first thing is you want to identify fundamental concepts that govern how machines behave. So this would be an interactive process of design, operation, evaluation optimization. Ultimately, you can produce a machine that could produce useful work, you could do that by interfacing molecular machines with nano microscale assembly. So of course, my interest is compartmentalization. But you can also integrate these compounds with materials and maybe eventually produce macro level properties. And then one sort of step goal after that could be molecular machines operating in concert. So now we have added equilibrium behavior, molecular networks, could we couple the ability of molecular machines operating together, can we construct molecular systems that display lifelike properties. And then of course, there's the applications which I've made very coarse grain here, still healthcare, we have molecular manufacturing, energy solutions, and molecular computing. Now, a lot of these targets on here, I believe a lot of people in this group will probably identify with things that have already been achieved or stuff that we've already done. And now I'll talk about in the remainder of the talk is I've picked out some specific examples. Also, as a taste of what we can expect over the next few months. I've included examples from I hope, every speaker that we have lined up, and that's going to give us an idea of where the field stands and some challenges that I've identified for the future. So my background, as I've said, is an organic synthetic chemist. So when I think of synthetic molecular machines, I think of structures that we have on on the screen. So you have pumps, like the polywood, taxane synthesizer by by start, you have these really elegant rotary motors by you know, finger and lean, we've had a lot of work done. On the theoretical basis by molecular machines, we're particularly focused on a lot of these synthetic systems is extremely important. And systems that display unidirectional motion. So the challenges here that I imagine is that, you know, do we need to increase our theoretical understanding of how these systems work to be able to really produce efficient designs, you know, can then we produce designs that operate more efficiently? No? Could they be autonomous? For example? Could the designs be more minimal? So a lot of these systems may maybe could be operated in more simplistic ways, but still have similar functions that might allow their incorporation to other systems. And then can we, of course, leverage the work that these molecules are able to produce, rather than simply having them operate in solution?
very quick, very quick question, James? Um, are these systems that you're illustrating and that you're thinking about all kind of running in an aqueous, like environment? Or are they kind of vacuum
some of the neural in solution not? Okay, they have to know often organic solution, typically, rather than water, but it's in solution. It's not in vacuum or anything like that. So one thing that you can then do is obviously, if you want to leverage the work produced, you can incorporate molecular machines into materials. And there have been examples of that. So you can take these rotary motor star systems and incorporate them into materials, this allows you to take say, a gel like system and contract it or expand it, you can incorporate these into mofs, which is a way to immobilize them and leverage work, you can take switches and put these into materials. This allows you to have a shape driven transformations at a macro level property. But then some potential challenges from this. So you know, can you then leverage this incorporation of materials to really actually produce some work in some capacity? And then of course, I said, My big goal be compartmentalizing these systems. And we'll touch on that in a second. And then would that allow you to produce gradients and maybe get useful work. And one thing I will add is that because I'm, I'm not an expert in all these fields, so if I've overlooked something or something's not been addressed properly by me here, one of the things you want in the discussion is people to chime in and correct things. You want this to be very safe space where people feel they can be openly discuss what's going on in the community. So I said about my big thing about compartmentalizing molecular machines. And that's been addressed in parts where you have things like Taxanes and incorporates the membranes to do to transport you've had rotary motors have already been placed into lipid membranes, and they can have the capacity to act as healthcare agents, they can kill cancer cells. But these don't have to be limited to the machines that we've already seen. You can take simple and non transporters. And by feeding them a fatty acid fuel, you can generate chloride gradients, you can take these really elegant assembling systems by material and produce gradients across membranes and this fantastic example by Devon's Gus, which also does the same thing. And this is also to highlight that we don't necessarily need, what people might argue is like a classic intellectual rotary rotary machine to get machine light behavior, you can take other systems and still get out of equilibrium structures. And so compartmentalization isn't done in parts. But these examples are still fairly limited. And there's a lot of expansion into that field over the coming years. Another way that you can incorporate machines into immobilize areas is to put them onto surfaces. And there's some examples of these that are here. So one that I identify with quite a lot is where you take FM systems and you can obviously interrogate the behavior of mechanical interlock molecules and machines on a surface like this with these four style curves that allows you to actually interrogate how these Micro Machines are operating, you can take single molecules and put these on a surface, and then actually drive them around these molecular single molecule gears that interact with each other using an STM tip. There's a lot of work done in this field, this is something that's very much outside of my comfort zone. And there's been some really amazing work done by Leonard green and Stephen Hecht, where you can take these switches and put them onto surfaces. And this really highlights how the structure of the surface and the structure of the molecule integral into how the molecule actually behaves. And so you can switch systems on and then off, and then on again, and the natural properties of the system very strictly dictate how the molecule behaves. And so for potential challenges in this area, like for me, this is something that I really know very little about my question, but I still some fundamental lessons to learn from, from this from these types of systems. To address the question we heard earlier, these To my knowledge, you actually under vacuum and ultra low temperatures is how these systems tend to be addressed. And we've already looked at these a force curves with these types of molecules. But can we interrogate machines using the same technology and then can we have greater control over single molecules? And then moving forwards we have things in drexels vision for where nanotechnology was going, we have things like molecular assemblers. And of course, I think a real archetype of this was was Lee's fun dailies, fantastic systems of these molecular assemblers where you have peptides that can be built. And then you can also make a peptide that can then perform analysis and you start to build something to these like riber zomo. Like
behaviors, you can make something that actually has a function, but in both of these, the track can't be reloaded. So it's destroyed once the system is finished. So could you make it non destructive? These obviously constructor ligaments, so could you make them the how robust are they Can you construct different ligaments with them another great diversity of chemistries per assembler. And in part that's also been addressed by another system from the league group where rather than having a track name, you've obviously got the single single stations, so you can reload the system in part, but it's not track anymore. So that maybe addresses one of these points, is there a way that you can combine these chemistries together, for example. And then we also have a really elegant system by Rhino huggers, where you bring two of these logarithm switches together, they produce this vanadate, which then once it's release is in and out of equilibrium state, and then it gets hydrolyze hydrolyzed, back. So this in part maybe is addressed the great diversity of systems that we'd be we'd be looking for, you can get individual systems that can do that. But is there a way to incorporate more functionality into one molecular assembler, I feel there's something that is still to be achieved. And one thing talking about a ligament, there was a nice example from the honeybee lab at the end of last year where this tetrahedron can recognize a ligament of certain lengths, and then edit them. So you can even now have the capacity to edit structures, which is something that biology is very, very good at. But in a selective way, I believe that chemists aren't quite so great. And then a really big area in this field is repurposing biology. So in the group that I previously worked in an animal with Scott cockcroft, you can take these systems that are derived from alpha hemolysin, which is also shown here to transmembrane nanopore, you can make this ranch system that uses enzymes, so it basically chews back this this primary units. And then once this unit gets quite small, you do a strong displacements of the system keeps going up and down a potential energy surface, you can put molecular Walker's into these systems and interrogate them at the single molecule level. So observe a single channel and observe a walker moving and other workers had been done by other systems on Friday, and other groups in synthetic systems as well, which I haven't had time to cover. You can coat vesicles, and life as ohms with enzymes and then drive these systems around. And there's something I find really, really amazing is you can take DNA origami, which we'll cover in a little bit more detail in a second, start making these really fantastic transmembrane channels, there's a lot of capacity to repurpose biology for our purposes here. And so I touched on DNA origami, where you can start to make these sort of, they're like Lego bricks that stuck together as one way that I've heard it described. And you can start to build things like you know, DNA robots that take cargos on the surface, and they sort them around, you can have systems where you can take DNA base systems and use them to make a ligaments and polymers. And then finally, one area that I was only introduced to a few weeks ago, when I was doing some research for what this group was doing was repurposing biology from the perspective of doing de novo protein design. And so he can make meshes out of proteins, you can even just build transmembrane channels to Nova technology that I find absolutely incredible. And you can build logic games. And so some potential challenges here that I foresee is, you know, could we design protein based molecular machines like the ones that I introduced in the first slide, but we have them custom built in a way that they behave in a way that we want them to do? Is that possible? I mean, if you can design these systems, I see no reason why it can't be done. But I have absolutely no idea. And then could this design approach and form the way that organic synthetic molecular machines work? So there are people in the community in the UK who do a lot of computational design into supranuclear architectures? Could we take a similar approach to these protein based systems and bring those into organic, synthetic molecular machines? But are there are also limitations to repurposing biology in this way? And is there a way that the synthetic approach that many of us are very interested in can complement the way that this biological approach also works.
And finally, one area that I've had a growing interest in since I worked at Northwestern for a while is the idea of molecular networks. And I've also included an equilibrium assembly and technology in here. So I've had some exposure to systems that can self replicate, or you have molecules that template the formation of other molecules. Of course, biology is very, very good at this. But can we make molecular assemblers that are capable of producing themselves This is an example by duck foot were the environments which is what this replicator is able to do from templating, one molecule, and then into a wet system where you form a new template where it just templates itself. You can have this system here where you can take a monomer, you activate it, and then that activated monomer starts to form fibrils. The fibril then changes the microenvironment of the system. So it gives you a feedback loop that controls how this this reaction behavior works. And that's how you control the self assembly. This controls the reaction cycle, you get a feedback loop that you can exploit and you can begin to tune the system. And then in recent years, chemists have started to started to explore technology and how to design in this sense, organic synthetic reactions. But could we also use technology in the same way that I described for biological systems to start informing us how we could Design synthetic molecular machines completely from from the ground up. So some potential challenges here, of course, network molecular machines will be a real big one, but identified at the start. So could you take some of these feedback loops, self replicative behaviors where these compounds interact with each other and make machines that work in the same way? Can we couple molecular networks with compartments in the boat COVID groups covered some aspects of our out of equilibrium behavior with with classmates, I believe that machines that respond to feedback loops, and then computational planning of machines synthesis. So moving back to the future challenges for, for where this field is going, I think when you when you look back at the slide that I had, at the beginning, I feel we've we've addressed in part many, many of these areas. Now we've already started designing, optimizing the systems over the past 20 years. And we started to address compartmentalization, integrating these systems with materials and atoms equilibrium behavior. And in molecular networks, I feel a lot of the applications are still quite a way away. And we sort of exist inside these top three units, maybe not lifelike properties. And that's a long scale goal for a lot of us. And it's nice trying to pin down where the real bottlenecks in these areas are to real to really drive change and advancement in this field. So finally, having covered my view of where the field is, and sort of my own personal perspective, I should cover some of the upcoming events. So next week, next Thursday, we have one of our funders, Isaac will come in and talk about the program overview for our query. This is an opportunity in this group, we want people to start thinking about projects and collaborations people can do together quite early on. So we've had a funder to come in to talk about what the funders are looking for, and what people believe might be fundable, know how you could address these challenges that people want to look at. And we think that's an important starting point to get this group discussing everything that's, that's going on within this community, and possibly in ways that haven't discussed it before. Bear in mind, that meeting will happen about three hours later than this one. A bit tricky, perhaps for some people in your and then our first meeting where we'll bring in the leaders. in this field, we'll be looking at artificial molecular machines. That's on the third Thursday of February, where we'll have talks with Professor David Lee Press. orbotech. Really interesting. steemians. So that session will be a little bit longer than an hour, probably be an hour and a half. So that's my perspective on what does the future hold for molecular machines? I would say it's, it's very bright. Where exactly it's going. I'm not sure. But I think all the examples I've shown indicate that we've we're certainly in a direction where we can address a lot of the big challenges. I think now the floor is open for, for discussion, and for people to weigh in with their opinions. So thank you, thank you very much.
Oh, much. antastic and stop sharing
my screen now.
Awesome. Okay. Great. Thank you very, very much, James. Korean, I'm going to ask you to hold up with your question until you introduce yourself and then you can you can go for it. Is that okay? Good. Alrighty. So now, I think James gave you a fantastic example of how you could introduce yourself. So now we kind of like give the floor up to all of you. And we would love to hear from everyone who is here. Yes, Melissa. That requires that requires a club. But we would love to hear from all of you. And we'd love to hear who's here. But rather than just saying who you are and what you're currently working on, we would ask you to think a little bit further. And to perhaps think about not only what you're working on and what you feel is working on, but also a challenge in your field that you'd like this group to solve. So similar to how James did it with a topic and then with a potential challenge. That would be fantastic if you wanted to take a stab at that as well. And I will start with our fellows up front as to give you a little bit more leeway to prepare something. And perhaps the young thing do you want to start if you're here?
Oh, yeah, hello, hello, one onion phone. So I'm looking for rust material. It's a mental organic framework. So my aim for that follow is to immobilize those dynamic molecular machines and to one robust solid material. So we can integrate among the bomb molecular machine, on the surface or on the internal pores of the firm of material and organize their behavior. For example, we can put molecular motor or molecular townfolk inside one porous material and get them to work together to make some useful work. That's my aim here for for this vision.
Yeah. Thank you so much. Yeah, and I think Ben already mentioned in the chat, and if we want to stick to around 30 seconds per intro, that would be fantastic. And then also always, whenever you've introduced yourself, just say hi in the chat so people can start chatting to you and can already start discussing things in the chat. All right, Jessica, are you here? It would be fantastic to hear from you next.
Oh, yeah. Hi. Okay, so I just moved to the US a weekend to start a position at Argonne National Lab. And my previous research at the University of Oxford primarily focused on synthesizing novel catalysts to produce biodegradable polymers. However, I'll go and I'll be focusing on developing new catalytic systems for plastic waste upcycling. So the goal is to break down the non biodegradable kind of typical polymers into short chain mono shorts, chains and monomers, which can then be reused. And one of the main challenges that I foresee in the near future involve catalytic control and flexibility. So how we can select it that selectively cleave individual bonds to give narrow molecular weight distributions with minimal side products, and also how we can start to apply these catalysts on industrial scales.
And has a much Please say hi in the chat, and I just added to the collaborative notetaking. Doc, right up front, a little section where you can introduce yourself and share the challenge that you'd like this group to solve. So if you want to take notes on that, as well, that would be awesome. Maxime? Are you here? Yep.
Hello.
So my name is Maxime or Maximus, most people in the US tend to call me. So I'm a research scientist in Oak Ridge National Lab in eastern Tennessee. One of the major focuses one of the main focuses of my research is on atom resolved in molecule resolve microscopy. So this includes scanning transmission electron microscopy, scanning tunneling microscopy, in atomic force microscopy. And what is so great about this microscopes is that we can use them not only for imaging with atomic precision, but also for manipulating individual atoms and molecules and assembling them into some potential useful structures. And so there's obviously one potential ways towards realization of molecular machines. And for the past couple of years, one of my main research interests was incorporating machine learning methods into experimental workflows. So basically, can we build a self driving microscope. And it turns out that the biggest difference between self driving microscope and self driving cars is that in self driving microscopes, you need to figure out how to incorporate physical constraints and domain knowledge into your AI routines. And this is probably one of the biggest challenge which requires in depth domain expertise. So but we had some successes very recently, and this is really exciting. work. So one thing I'm looking forward to within this fellowship, I guess, is that I think that a lot of things that we're working on, applicable beyond just microscopy, and I'm really looking forward to connecting with people who might be potentially interested in applying some of these methods in for some other characterization techniques and also for synthesis, and perhaps also for surgical simulations. So sorry, I spent more than 30 seconds on my Thank you.
That was quite the laundry list there. Thomas Ruda. Your next is you here. Hello, everyone.
I'm Tom Schrader. I'm currently a postdoc in join Eisenberg's group at Harvard. And I'm the 2021 foresight fellow in biologically inspired engineering, which is a theme that's been kind of constant throughout my research. So I work on macromolecule controlled energy transduction processes that rely on ion transport typically. And so I have two kind of main focus areas, both of which are related to molecular machines insofar as they rely on switchable super molecular interactions. So the first one is, I'm looking at controlling crystallization processes using the phase behavior and interactions between phase behavior of polymers and the interaction between those polymers and the growing surfaces of crystals. And this is inspired by antifreeze proteins in insects and fish applications area the application areas there are material fabrication as well as the release of thermal energy in pattern waves. And then the second project is membrane based hydro gel Ion atronics, which is to say, electrical circuitry that is based on the flow of ions as opposed to electrons. And in these stimuli, responsive polymer membranes lead to the creation and processing of electrical signals. This is work that's very much inspired by neurons. I, during my PhD looked at different types of excitable tissue and kind of replicating them in in soft materials. So I'm mostly looking forward to meeting people interested in specifically membrane based molecular machines but also who have expertise or interest in materials, fabrication and involving crystal into it.
Yeah antastic and then we have the last fellow then we want to hear from all of you during Gen Q and I'm hoping that I'm not butchering your name too much. Hi.
Hi,
Hello everyone. My name is Lee until I have been a postdoc since 2017 at working with surgery, the stator here at Northwestern University. So, my main research focus here is to design and the things is artificial molecular machines, in particular, artificial molecular pumps, and try to use artificial molecular machines as a synthetic tool and the precise incisor to make materials and try to find applications in polymer chemistry and material science. So I really like James intro, I think they touch on most of my interest. And in particular, I am very interested in exploring how to build a sophisticated artificial molecular machines mimicking just like the polymerases the bio functions, but in this case, how we can make an unnatural product and natural polymers out of synthetic and molecular machines and try to mimicking the sophistication of the biomed molecular machines can do. So, I think the long long term challenge in this field is I think, why is the robot the robustness of the molecular machines that can accommodate industrial or biological conditions. And also realize to James point on protein based, you know, sophisticated molecular machines that that I think is one of the most exciting area in the future. Maybe.
Thank you
so much. Then I will just go with someone who's here my screen Dean is to me and I see you would you like to say hi?
Yeah, so I am Dean Osterman. I am a theorist. I have been working on the theory of molecular motors for a long time with a special emphasis on understanding how microscopic reversibility plays into the theory by which we can understand molecular machines. I mean, similar to thermodynamics, providing the stimulus for the Mechanical and Industrial Revolution, we need a good theory for developing molecular machines. And the specific area that I would like to emphasize and challenge people to work on is that building and designing allosteric interactions, how can we arrange it that the mechanical position of the machine determines the chemical reactivity and vice versa?
Fantastic. Thank you so much. I will just go according to the order that people are here on my screen. Next one up, we have Korean avid.
Ah, thanks, Alison. Great to see everyone. Let's see, I've been around with foresights. Since the 90s. I was a Fineman Prize winner and that technology in the mid 90s, and a fellow more recently, in 2020. And I am not super active in molecular nanotechnology at this time, but I love it. And so I'm really honored to be here. I do have a question to kick isn't what can I ask my question? Now Elson?
Ask it and maybe James can answer it in the chat.
Yeah, this is the thing. It doesn't even have to be answered right now. It's just something that perhaps we could have a future discussion on, which is the there's a lot of talk about molecular machines. And then we see pictures of these things that spin around and shuttle back and forth. And we see movies about ribosomes. But there's the idea that molecules are much more than just hinges and motors and things like that. They're electronic transfer, muting devices like a ribosome, changes wave functions and puts together proteins. And anyway, so many biological macromolecules are not simply mechanical or even mechanical at all. They're electronic in nature, and quantum in nature. And so what I'm wondering is, you know, the foresight molecular nanotechnology community, how we kind of avoid this schism that we still seem to have, you know, 20 years after or 15 years after I got on board, which is the molecular vacuum phase machine people are even now the solution phase machine people and the sort of bio inspired transformational nano chemistry people. And that
was a lot to discuss in the chat. Thank you. Do young leaves. Hi,
my name is Guillaume VIVUS, I'm in Paris, I must say Professor crunch turns, it's difficult to pronounce my name for non French people. So in English, it's William. So I'm a chemist, I'm working in supermarket chemistry. And that means derivatives in switchable molecule tweezers to controls property at the molecular level, such as luminescence, magnetism, or catalysis. And by using mechanical motion, and I'm looking forward walking on multifunctional materials, and I'm also interested in and working on cyclodextrin rotaxane. And try to exploit the symmetry to achieve any directional motion. So looking for an direction with maybe theory session to understand how to talk to to achieve to make motors and not only switches
antastic. Thank you. Do we have Dave Lee still on the call?
Hi, Allison. Yes, I'm here. Welcome. Hi, everyone from lovely ink. We're synthetic chemistry group. So we build molecules. And I was trying to think of how to come up with something clever to say that in 30 seconds about what we do that encompasses what we do, but I couldn't come up with anything really, it's what we really try and try to do is to add value with molecular machinery. So the community for a long time has been building simple switches, simple sorts of structures. And we'd like to know how adding those together gives you more than the sum of its parts, just like when you do engineering in the big world. The complicated machines that we make Well, in fact, even the simplest machines are made of even simpler components, which when you have the working together, they do more complicated things than was possible before. And that's what we are still trying to do in our group.
And has to thank you so much. Will
Yeah, hi, everyone. Good to see you.
Thank you.
Thanks to Jane for his very nice introduction. very much appreciated. Lots of good references there.
Yeah, my name is Derrick grill, I'm coming from the vacuum side and the surface side of Mulliken machines and, and relocated was mentioned already before a little bit, we're looking on single motors on surfaces and, and try to understand, you know, try to follow the pathways of these molecules on the surface and understand the basic fundamental processes within the molecules. And there is actually quite a lot of questions there can stand the concept, as Dean already mentioned before, of microscopic visibility on this level of single molecules, and how much can you influence this or control it via the chemical structure to surface and other things. So this is my, my perspective. I'm looking forward to this to all these events. Thanks.
Thank you for joining. And next one, we have Yvonne.
I'm sorry, I was not expecting that. I'm gonna bring him in. I'm from Dartmouth. My group works on developing new molecular switches. We develop chemically activated switches, we develop light activated switches. And we try to turn them into molecular machines. We're going to keep this very short because I just basically pointed you out to perspective I wrote about the future of molecular machines. If you are interested to know what I really think about them. It's all there.
That's it.
Awesome, thank you. Next one up, we have Matthew writer.
Find the unmute button.
Thanks, Alison. My research sort of heavily uses a mixture of neutron scattering and synchrotron techniques in conjunction with an awful lot of computational work primarily DFT and MD, to understand the response properties and material stability of various or highly porous materials and polymeric systems, primarily trying to understand the molecular scale and then scale up to control various mechanical thermal enlightened Joost phenomenon on response on a macro scale. So I would say the challenge that we have, if that's what we're trying to focus on is understanding something very idealistic level on how to actually propagate that into a real life scenario, obviously taking into account defects, particle size, grain boundaries and stuff like that. And I'm located at Oak Ridge National Lab, by no course who provides three students, our Texas a&m University. My 30 seconds.
Thank you so much. Awesome. Yes. Next one up, we have Larissa and I will always ping you privately in the chat before it's your turn.
Thank you, I just got them. Hi, I'm Marissa from clinic, I just recently started as a junior group leader in at the University of Bonn in Germany. And I'm interested in systems that assemble out of equilibrium. So it's kind of the step before molecular machines, if you will. So because molecular machines, I mean, they need a driving force to operate. And I'm looking into things that basically assemble by giving a driving cost to that. And while the question for the community that I really like to address this, like, how can we find new driving forces for such accuracy shields, or fuels? And as there's always big discussions about what is actually a fuel, what is energy dissipation? And to address those questions, and generate revenue, reversibility, and molecular machines as well. Yeah, I'm really excited and looking forward to everything. So thank you. And next time we have you actually more joking.
Yes, hi, hi. Sorry, I put my face on. Hey, my face on I everyone I listen. It's a long time, Melissa, we don't see each other in a planet. Saving stuff. Anyway, I also Leo dahveed. And Sophia from the memo project, European member project. And I didn't for a long time in Hong Kong long time ago. I am. So I'm representing a group of people in Toulouse, France. Sorry, I also do, which was in truth also long time ago. We are basically one part organic chemist, one Park UHV experimental contact the FM STM, trying to drive and manipulate molecules one by one. And to try to attack connect and communicate information and data to a single molecule. We're also development in our cusd cleanroom, where we got to develop a plan our technology to have a single molecule computing. And also we have a bit of theory and quantum engineering, going from classical to semi classical to quantum design, or Zeus machine. And finally, just to notice, for gems, and maybe for listen to get a bit of debate between molecular machine and molecule machine, since you listen on that and I must insist that molecule machine is really a subclass of molecular machine. But this is completely different from the big stuff we see from ATP synthesis, for example, a single molecule design to make a moto or logy get or larger, in terms of designs to be different from just huge amount of molecule rotating in solution.
I see we can dedicate a whole another session to that. And this is also an invitation from all of us to all of you. If you have proposals for meetings that you'd like to host, then let me know. And I will schedule that and I will send it to the whole group. So this is your, you know, the stage is yours. Please, please, please make use of this group as much as you'd like. And I will let you know in case it gets too spammy. But I don't doubt it. I think every one of those topics are highly worth exploring. David, you're next.
Thank you. Hi, everyone. Yeah,
I'm David August.
I'm currently a postdoc in the group of David Lee. So actually work on the other side of things. So topology, so building knots, links and woven materials. But that's obviously focuses on manipulating molecules at the nanoscale. But from a personal perspective, as well, I'm also really interested in in dynamic networks and how building up networks of molecules and how they communicate. And that's something I'm very much into. So yeah, I'm completely new to the group. So thank you.
Thank you so much. And I didn't get him to when you first bought your book book. have you here. Would you like to go? Yeah,
I'd love to. So thank you. Thank you for welcoming me. My research is based in Munich, I'm an assistant professor there. And what we do is we look at mechanisms how we can transduce chemical energy into the formation of self assemble structure. So this is very much inspired by the way that microtubules are formed by ATP hydrolysis or actin filaments are based, built via ATP hydrolysis. And the reason why we do that is one to better understand biology to better understand how can we maybe one day synthesize something that looks like a living system, but also to create materials that have properties like living systems? So along the way, I think one of the challenges that we found is that if you actually want to create materials as sophisticated as biology, you need to be able to skill up your stuff. So if you come in with milligrams of material is difficult to make an actual material out of it. So I think that's one of the biggest challenges with these very sophisticated molecules. How can we make grams preferably kilograms out of that? Thank you very much.
Thank you so much, Ben. Next,
I assume you're talking about me, then I'll be really fast. I am. A My background is not in chemistry. But I am really interested in building systems out of molecular machines that can actually do near term useful things, and sort of drive the research forward. And so I've put
some links
in the chat. And I should
definitely reach out, I want to talk to all of you.
Thank you so much, and you were again, fast enough to pass it, I couldn't want the next one at Timothy Barron Did you hear I would love to hear from you.
Hi, there. I'm also new to the group. So thank you very much for inviting me. I'm at the University of Birmingham, I'm a new lecturer just started my research group. In the past, I've worked on mechanical interlocks, molecular switches. And starting up my new group, I'm really interested in incorporating local machine behavior into optical switches. And in fact, I guess the challenge and one of the things that I'm really interested in finding out more about by this group is how we see dynamic properties of these molecules in the solid state and in materials as well. So be fascinated to join in on discussions like that. So Hello, everyone, and again,
thank you for having me a lot.
Thank you for joining had your next.
Okay, thanks, Alison. My name is Tad Hogue, I'm affiliated with the Institute for Molecular manufacturing, foresight sister organization. I've helped over several years writing reports for the foresight technical workshops, like a theory background in physics and distributed computing in swarms. I'm currently working on quantifying applications of diamond oil, molecular machines, including things like mechanical computers with very low power if they're used with reversible logic, interested in both classical and quantum computing, with potential applications to microscopic robots for medicine. So I mainly use simulate simulations to identify the requirements for these machines. That knows seeing we have potential capabilities far beyond the kinds of things that biology can do, but also with a very large drawback that we don't really have ideas of how to manufacture such machines, especially in the large numbers you need for useful applications. So a challenge what I'm pretty interested in learning from this group is since we don't have experiments yet, with million atom machines, it's difficult to validate simulation tools such as gromacs, and molecular dynamics. So any ideas for improving or validating such simulations? I'm very open to look forward to hearing about
Thanks. Thank you, and we'll see you next.
Hi, everyone, I'm Sophie I am Sophie Devi from the University of Belgium. And my research concerns single molecule for spectroscopy, which consists in pooling on single molecules to measure mechanical chemical processes
in molecules.
And we in fact, we have adopted single molecule for spectroscopy to study small molecules, because originally this technique was made for studying big objects like proteins and we have adapted it to study small molecules. And we have been collaborating with deeply to measure on the work that wood accents can produce. And also with Phasers to that to measure the folding of oligo toxins against mechanical forces, and, in fact, we are interested in pushing the limits of single molecule spectroscopy to detect very small changes in molecules and fight To measure the operation of functional molecules,
thank you so much welcome. I use ma'am.
Yes, thank you and welcome, everyone. So we are into building synthetic motors that are chemical power. So autonomous, chemical powered motors from micron scale all the way down to nanometer scale. And Jim was kind enough to show one of our nature nanotechnology paper where we, we put things on vesicles, enzymes and vesicles and use photolysis to move these ensure that they will chemotaxis up substrate gradient or down substrate gradient. So we're trying to move more and more closer to lifelike properties. And two of the things that we've gotten really fixated on is how to build in memory into these systems, and how to convert the energy that we harvest by chemical reactions into information. So as I said, these are some of the hallmarks of living systems. And that's what we are looking at now.
Fantastic. Okay. Well, we have lots to look forward to and all of the keynotes already MSD. Folks, you're next.
Thank you, Alison. I've been invited to several of the foresight workshops and have residual personal interest in the potential utility of finger motors. The whole idea that an entropic system can be in a sense directional in some way inspires me to ask the question, can we stereo specifically gang these finger finger motors together to in a sense, exploiting for let's say, passive or active nano fluidic systems? Can we convert molecular vibrational energies into directional fluid flows or the ability to sort molecules?
quite bold, and I think you edited to the collaborative nodes dog as well, so people feel free to answer him there as well. Okay, next one at a milestone. Hi,
I'm Adam marble stone. I'm currently working more on the funding side. And I'm looking for actionable moonshot projects that can't be funded by normal mechanisms. And about 10 years ago, I was involved in the DNA nanotechnology field on writing CAD software for DNA origami. So I'll put some background in the chat.
Thank you very much, Marty, you're next. Your mute Marty. Hi,
I'm Marty Adelstein, my main interests are in the design of self assembling molecular building blocks. And I'm on the commercial side. And what we've been doing is using these building blocks to make two dimensional, quite large water purification membranes. And we are interested in using this as a renal replacement therapy. We have begun making components from molecular machines that are self assembling via D grant. And, and I'm quite interested in using some of these components for in vivo diagnostics.
Plastic Thank you, Damien. Next,
hi, Alison. Hi, everyone, it's good to see some a lot of familiar faces. So I'm Damian, and I'm from the edge in Belgium. I'm currently working with until February. So my background is in atomic force microscopy. And so to explain, so I will not explain again, I spent one year with Fraser stirrat at Northwestern. I'm also 2019 for such fellow. And right now I'm developing another single micro technique for synthetic molecule, which is optical tweezers. So maybe the question I would have for you is what kind of molecule would like would you like to study by single medical techniques? So please, have a chat with me.
Lovely, and Jonathan. Jonathan Barnes if you hear
Okay, sorry, I'm a little bit slow on the uptake. So Hello, everybody. My name is Jonathan Barnes, assistant professor of chemistry at washu. Just want to start out by saying thank you guys for posting this really awesome meeting because COVID sucks and it's really nice to still be able to connect with people and to share ideas. And James, thank you for that really nice introduction. I think you're totally wonderful. My presentation from a couple of years ago to introduce molecular machines. So I applaud you, sir. And okay, so let me get back on track because I'm Mr. Tangent. Thank you to all the foresight team as well, just for keeping this going. I think it's really important to continue this discussion. And a little bit about me, I did my PhD with Fraser Stoddard at Northwestern. I did my postdoc at MIT with Jeremy Johnson. And so now I'm at washu. I've been here for about four and a half years. And I'm really interested in developing functional polymeric systems, and specifically ones that we can pre program and make custom polymers for precise applications. So something that that really, I guess I kind of pay close attention to in the comments so far was YouTube's comment about developing materials that are molecules that there's a lot of sophisticated molecules out there. But sometimes the synthesis to make them is very challenging, and low yielding. And so one of the things my group is interested in is how can we bridge the gap, right, between developing as a chemist these really complex, sophisticated systems that can switch and move and build and self assemble? How can we scale that into a material that's useful? So my group does a lot of work with vibrations through the medical school or looking at stem cell differentiation with hydro gels, we do a lot of photo active work, I'm also really interested in and I'd love to talk to a lot of you about it. How to use the mechanical bond not for for machines, maybe this is the antithesis of this meeting, I'm about to go on a tangent. But how can we use it in materials right there, it's very under explored form of bonding, I find reels. And so this is something that we're really interested in is just coming up with better ways to synthesize molecules that have mechanical bond, so that we can scale it and make materials and study the effect of those materials. And so that's just, you know, that's kind of the core focus, I think of my group and I've gone way over and Carson has given me the I so I'll stop talking. Wait, if God questions, send it to me in the chat box.
We have your next and then Claudia.
Hi, everyone. My name is Julian. I'm at the University of St. Andrews in the UK. And I'm a synthetic chemist who has a relatively long ago background in INTRALOT molecule molecular machines and motors. microchip now mostly work with colloidal nanomaterials in the mean nanoparticles and like gold nanoparticles and so on. We're interested in an interfacing, dynamic molecular systems of all sorts really with with nanomaterials, we like to think of our nanoparticles really as just big molecules, we like to characterize them and understand them with the same sort of precision, as we we generally do for molecules. And, and up to know we've only really interfaced quite simple systems with our nanoparticles. But we'd, of course, very much like to interface nanoparticles with molecular machines. We'd like to use nanoparticles as scaffolds, perhaps for coordinating molecular machines or bringing them together on a surface. We would like to, and perhaps even one day, make a molecular machine with nanoparticle or nano sized components. And and eventually use that technology to translate or amplify the operation of molecular machines into the macroscopic world and see genuinely progressive, machine based operation and translated into the macroscopic world rather than simple switching back and forth between two states.
Thank you. Wow, that was quite a laundry list as well. Claudia, you're next.
Hi, everyone. I am not sure I'm the new program, the newest member of the group I joined yesterday. So thanks a lot for accepting me here. And it's been amazing so far. So I'm currently a medically fellow in Cambridge in the UK. And I'm going to start my independent career in Strasburg at ISIS in September this year, and I'm the underlying theme of my research has been the origin of life and how chemistry turns into biology basically. And what I'm going to focus on what I'm working on right now are functionalized light prisms. And what I'm going to work on in the future are lifelike systems that have lifelike behaviors. So what I'm particularly interested to the reason I joined this group is because I want to learn and I want to be inspired. I hope to be inspired, and I hope I'll be able to contribute as well. What I'm particularly interested in is I want molecular machines can inspire origin of life. Research, and how simple can molecular machines be and still being, you know, working and mimicking biology. So that's a quite specific thing I'm interested in. But I'm also interested in something that James mentioned during his presentation, which is whether you can combine different systems, for example, whether you can compartmentalize molecular machines, and still have them working, or whether you can have multiple molecular machines working in concert in concert. So I think these are the kinds of interesting points I discuss about.
Oh, it's lovely that we already have overlap. This is this is great. Okay, Stefan? Hi.
I'm Stefan Bosley. I'm a postdoc in Professor David Lee's group. So what he said basically covers it. I guess more specifically, I'm particularly interested in autonomously fueled molecular machines.
Wow, that wasn't great.
We got you next. Sorry.
It's actually Alex Lippert. Um, I came in a little bit late in. So I'm, I'm a professor at SMU in Dallas. And we work on a number of different things, including one thing that we're working on most recently is a way to do a single molecule lithography using them super resolution microscopy techniques. And the idea is that we want to use this to, you know, kind of put molecular components together to actually kind of make different types of molecular machinery.
out in Swede Julia, you're next?
Hi, everybody. It's Julia here. I'm currently a researcher at the University of Western Australia straining the area of the facial interlock molecules and self assembly. And one of the questions that to me is particularly interesting is how the operating principles of artificial molecular machines can be applied to perform tasks that are different from the motion. Some have been mentioned before. So one, for example, is memory. One is self assembly itself. And one is energy storage, for example. Thank you very much for your contribution. All of them were very interesting to me.
Very cool. Thank you. Next up, we have Charlie.
Hi, everyone.
So I did my PhD with Professor Lee looking at building molecular machines. And then they moved down to Cambridge to work with Professor nisca, looking at how we can make self assembled capsules. And I'm just about to start my own independent group at the Francis Crick Institute in London, and at King's College in London, really looking at how we can apply these systems to biological questions. So I'm really interested in what kind of interfaces are our way of living systems. So thank you for having me in the group.
Welcome, and Lorenzo. Hi.
Oh, hi, everyone. So I work in the startup group, here in northwestern. And I have the fortune or misfortune of being also a lab manager of the group. And in the past, I've worked on sensors, fluorescent sensor, in particular for neutral molecule, and charged species. While now I'm working on molecular machine and self assembly, as well. And I think, one I've been to a couple of foresight competition before. And it's really exciting to be back here into this new format. And I think one of the challenges for me for the future will be to how to use molecular machines or anyway fuel system, or autonomous system to sort of answer the question on how information is transmitted at the molecular scale. And this could be either as instruction sets for like self assembly, or movements, or for example, for transmission of quantum information.
Thank you and welcome to Renzo. Next up. We have Steve gold up. Hi,
thank you really enjoying this so far. So I'm Steve Golda. I'm a synthetic chemist at the University of Southampton in the UK. And what we work on is interlock molecules for various applications, including as molecular machines. So I would say our day to day job is trying to identify the unique properties of these systems and demonstrate them and things like photolysis materials chemistry and Chemical Biology. And taking a step back, I guess the big question for me is how we take these exciting observations and then translate them into something useful and there's often quite a big gap between the 10 milligram so I mentioned milligrams earlier. And the kilograms you To really make an impact. I think that's a real challenge. And one of the things we need to do, obviously, is accelerate the design and development process. And Kim mentioned some really cool modeling stuff. That's, that's the kind of thing we need to bring to bear on these problems, I think, at least from my point of view, so thank you.
Wow, great. And we're nearing the end. I think we only have five more minutes left or so Sandra, you're up next, if you hear.
Hi, so I'm sending. So some of these may. And I'm sorry, joining quite late today. So I miss James is saying introduction. So I worked for five years, with men feeling calm molecular motors in honing in. And two years ago, I moved to Leiden University in the Netherlands to be able to have my own research team. So I'm working there as an assistant professor now. And currently, I'm mostly interested in in interfacing, molecular machines with biology. I heard also, more people are interested in this now. And mainly at Yeah, it's studying how we can manipulate, study and manipulate biological systems using molecular machines. Any particular way, we're looking at extremely responsive transmembrane transport systems. And also now we got more interested in to simulate signal processing events, between chemical systems and in the future also compartmentalised systems. So yeah, I'm very excited to be part of this, this team and looking forward to all the all the nice discussions. So thank you.
Well, welcome. And welcome, Victor as well. You're next on my list. All right. Thank
you, everyone. My name is Victor Garcia. I'm, I started recently as an assistant professor, that Louisiana State University, and I'm working in the design of new synthetic molecular machines to modulate cell function. And we are particularly interested in light activated molecular machines and also chemically activated molecular machines.
Short and sweet. Thank you, and and welcome. And then I have next one up. Do you do, Jim, do Bo, did you already go? Because I think we're gmv?
Yeah, thanks.
Yeah, thanks. Thanks for having me in the group. And then Thanks, Jim, for the introduction was really a really interesting, good overview. So synthetic organic chemists, my group is based at the University of Manchester. And basically, what we like to do is stretch molecules to see how they break or rearrange the tension is most basically part of the field of polymer mechanical chemistry. So essentially, we have mechanosensitive groups. And then we use interest and in solution to activate them. And so yeah, we have a particular interest into exploring the chemistry trying to understand you know, how molecules behave and the tension. And another aspect will be keen is to explore the mechanochemistry of the mechanical advantage. So we, we try to stretch them and see how they behave, and the tension, how they break breaks, and ultimately try to, you know, use mechanical force to activate or operate molecular machines in the future. So yeah, thank you. I'm really I'm really looking forward to all the events of this group.
Fantastic. Thank you, Carson. I see you here. Welcome, Carson.
Hi, everyone, nice to see you and hear your ideas. This has been a really fun meeting to attend. My name is Carson Bruns. I'm an assistant professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, and this radically interdisciplinary Institute called the Atlas Institute. And so my colleagues my neighbors are roboticists and designers and all kinds of mechanical engineers. So I sort of see myself as a person who's trying to kind of bring the chemistry of Taxanes and molecular machines into the domain of engineering. I'm trying to collaborate with the people who are near me to engineer things with these types of molecules and materials and to work with different types of materials. We're interested in sort of biomedical materials. So the thing that I lab is probably best known for and our independent work is taking molecular switches and turning them into tattoo inks that can, you know, change color and signal some sort of health problem or risk, but then we're also working on semiconductors and the so called slide ring materials burst based on polio vaccines. So but in general, it's a materials focused group. It's good to be here. Thanks.
Thank you so much. And next up, we have new home. Okay, then, let's see. Next one up. Christine, would you like to introduce yourself? Sure. Hi.
I'm Christine Peterson, I'm a senior fellow at foresight Institute, also co founder. You can basically think of me as Allison's predecessor. So especially if you can't reach Allison or Lou, I'm always available. Reach out to me at Peterson and foresight. org, and I'll try to help you with whatever you need. I mainly do a lot of connecting people these days. So if you're looking for connections, I'm happy to help with that.
Thank you. Okay. And then we have Gail here as well. And Gail Alou and I think that we're done. Al, are you here? Otherwise, we'll go with you.
I am the program and operation director of foresight Institute. I've been working for three years now with Allison very closely. And yes, I can help you if there is any issue. And if you need to reach me. That's all I'll be more of an observer in this group, then a participant that I am overjoyed for its existence.
Okay, lovely. Who did I miss? Okay, I'm hoping that that's that I didn't miss anyone. Hey, thank you so much for a staying on, and P for providing such incredible introductions and actually posing challenges to the group. And we weren't quite sure whether we could already go so far out with you on the first one, but like, thanks for thanks for doing this. And I really, again, invite you to make the most of this group, right. So now you already know a little bit about what other people here are interested in, reach out to me at a at force i.org. To schedule meetings, right? This email is kind of like you're kind of like a team of close collaborators. And you already know a little bit what they're interested in. So I'm very happy to schedule kind of sub meetings and satellite meetings, we have a skeleton program. But that doesn't mean that you can't, you can't build up on that. Ideally, what we're hoping to do in the first half of the year, is actually create a few working groups around common interests, and then in the second half of the year, and we'll have a few mentors and a few people that help those folks who are interested in pushing progress around those common interest areas along and that to the little working group with mentorship and support, and maybe do some final project presentations at the end of the year. I will share a little bit more about that at the next meeting that we have. The next meeting is with Isaac zeoli from ARPA, he will be discussing ARPA E's, current programs, which is a big, big funding source for many folks and technology. So I'm hoping that those of you who are interested in that and will show up and hopefully we can learn a little bit more about what kind of programs they already have and what programs they should be having. Right. This is an opportunity for all of us to tell them why the Department of Energy and Opera in particular and its needs more programs that make use of all the technology and signs that you all are working on. Okay, great. So with that, I will just share with you another link to and a more informal meeting room that for those of you who are still interested in staying on, please follow us there, it's on gather, some of you who have already joined us at our member gathering in December have already used that room. It is our molecular machines group at our molecular machines lounge, and it is access with the password mollema. I will share it now in the chat here. And so this is concluding the official part of today's meeting. From now it's just in case you want to hang out in case you want to say hi to people in this more informal chat room, there are a few things that you need to that you need to take into account. When joining this room. You need to put a password in you need to close the Zoom Room, you need to allow your microphone and camera and you can just walk around and sit at a table. If it doesn't work, no worries, and you will meet everyone again in a week from now for the next meeting. And then let me know then I can onboard you for future meetings because we're hoping that after the end of every normal meeting like this, we can have an informal an informal session on this room on this gather app. Where you can all just hang out with each other at different tables. All right, we're concluding the main part with this. Thank you so, so much for staying on. And thank you so, so much for kicking this off with such a strong note. And and yeah, we hope that that you will make the most of this this year right this is your your group now and, and we really can't wait to collaborate with you,
James, do
I? Am I missing anything? No,
I think you covered it all pretty well.
I will be in touch with you again and I will share this info intro video with all of you so you can follow up again on who is who and who can you reach out to please fill out the form that we shared so people can find you. And I'm meeting a few of you hopefully now in the gather for and more informal meeting read. Thank you, everyone. And I'll see you already next week. Next week for Isaac.