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Ross Jaggers and Stefan Bon from report in Materials Horizons the fabrication of hydrogel objects which can be individually programmed to uniquely respond to a shared external trigger, and have the ability to communicate with one another when in proximety.

Ross Jaggers and Stefan Bon from report in Materials Horizons the fabrication of hydrogel objects which can be individually programmed to uniquely respond to a shared external trigger, and have the ability to communicate with one another when in proximety.

Ross Jaggers and Stefan Bon from report in Materials Horizons the fabrication of hydrogel objects which can be individually programmed to uniquely respond to a shared external trigger, and have the ability to communicate with one another when in proximety.

Prestigious RSC awards for Prof. Rachel O'Reilly, Dr Józef Lewandowski and PhD student Zoe Ayres.

On Sunday, Dave Haddleton was presented with an award for “recognition of outstanding service and contribution to the Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing” at the RSC Editors Symposium banquet at the Guildhall in London. The award was given for service on the Board of “Chem Comm”, and for being Editor in Chief – and launching – “Polymer Chemistry”.

The latest research into the use of biomaterials to increase the availability of donor cells has been . Donor cells (e.g blood, bone marrow) are crucial to modern healthcare but due to their short shelf life they must be frozen using organic solvents as 'antifreezes'. The Gibson group has pionnered the use of synthetic polymers which inhibit ice crystal growth and their application to cryopreservation. In this work, a collaboraiton with the team used biomimetic block copolymer micelles to provide a hydrated 'matrix' around the cells, which in combination with ice inhibiting polymers enable succesful cryopreservation of red blood cells. This is the first example of a cryopreservation system using entirely synthetic polymer materials, providing control and additional functionality into the system. Post-thawing, the micelles warm up, and become 'worm-like' which enabled the direct formation of a hydrogel, which is of interest for tissue engineering.

Read the paper here

Professor Rachel O'Reilly has received (8th December) the 2014 McBain Medal. This was awarded for her pioneering research in novel polymeric nanoparticles, responsive materials and controlled self-assembly.

A 糖心TV Chemistry undergraduate researcher, Bethany Dean has won an award to allow her to travel to Australia (!) to attend the . She will present the work she conducted in the on understanding how synthetic polymers affect ice nucleation - A process which is still not understood despite its obvious important in process from cloud formation, to cryopreservation to making ice cream!

Read her paper on this topic here (with another undergrad student, Jamie Kasperczak-Wright);

A recent paper by the in Chem Commun has been highlighted in the RSC Magazine 'Chemistry World'. The Gibson Group have a research program focussed on mimicking the function of Antifreeze Proteins which are found in Polar fish species. These proteins can slow the rate of ice growth, which has been identified as a challenge in the cryopreservation of donor cells and tissue for transplantation. In this work they showed a facile route to new cryoprotective polymers, using cheap, commodity polymer starting materials. These polymers were shown to have ice growth inhibition activity and to signficantly reduce the ice-induced damage during red blood cell freeze/thaw storage. In a second paper, the group also reported signficantly enhanced cryopreservation using poly(vinyl alcohol).

Read the Chemical Communications article here;

Read our recent ACS Biomaterials Science and Enginneering paper here

has been awarded the 2015 'PAT Young Talent Award' during the 13th Polymers for Advanced Technologies conference in HongZhou, China. The award is sponsered by Wiley and Polymers for Advanced Technologies and also ACS Materials and Interfaces. Matt was selected by a panel following lectures from the shortlisted candidates from around the world, after being nominated.

At the Chemistry Departments annual postgraduate symposium, Robert Deller () and Athina anastasaki () won the prizes for the best PhD Theses. The Thesis prize is Sponsored by the Faculty of Science.

The and groups are involved in 2 new projects intended to promote translation of new technologies. These projects are funded by the Industrial Biocatalyst program supported by Innovate UK, BBSRC and EPSRC and span a range of UK universities and companies.