Speaker:

Prof. Alberto Bianco, CNRS.

Tittle: Engineering Amino Acid–Based Nanoparticles for Targeted Cancer Therapy

Time: 14:00 July 8th, 2026 (Wednesday)

Venue: Conference Room No.6, Building No.5

Host: Prof. Xing-Jie Liang

Abstract:

Dr. Alberto Bianco received his PhD in 1996 from the University of Padova. As a visiting scientist, he worked at the University of Lausanne, the University of Tübingen (as an Alexander von Humboldt fellow), the University of Padova and Kyoto University. He is currently Distinguished Research Director at the CNRS in Strasbourg. His research interests focus on the design of multifunctional carbon and 2D nanomaterials, and soft nanoparticles for therapy, diagnostics and imaging. He is also interested on their health impact, particularly on the immune system. He has published more than 390 articles (h-index: 105, > 60000 citations). In 2017 he has been elected Fellow of the European Academy of Science and in 2020 of the Academia Europaea, and in 2019 he has obtained the CNRS Silver Medal. Since 2011 he is Editor of the journal CARBON.

Info.:

The self-assembly of amino acid derivatives has emerged as a powerful strategy for biomedical applications. This seminar presents binary nanoparticles formed through the co-assembly of Fmoc-protected aromatic amino acids for drug delivery and combined cancer therapies. While Fmoc-tyrosine and Fmoc-phenylalanine typically assemble into nanofibers, the addition of Fmoc-tryptophan drives their transformation into nanoparticles. These assemblies are governed by non-covalent interactions, which can limit their structural stability. To overcome this limitation, covalent dityrosine crosslinks were introduced through side-chain irradiation. The resulting crosslinked nanoparticles showed greatly improved mechanical robustness and chemical stability. They were subsequently loaded with the anticancer drug doxorubicin. A tannic acid–iron coating was applied to impart glutathione sensitivity and photothermal functionality. This enabled controlled drug release and photothermal heating. The platform demonstrated strong anticancer efficacy in vitro and in tumour-bearing mice via synergistic chemo-photothermal therapy. Alternatively, we have developed multifunctional amino acid-based porous nanoparticles coated with polydopamine, and functionalized with quinidine, for the sequential drug delivery to overcome multidrug resistant cancer.