Biological functionalization of polymer membranes

In Nature, membranes play a crucial role. They maintain the cell integrity toward its environment, and they also separate the different organelles. Through the membranes, many functions are achieved. For example, transport is made through proteins embedded in the membrane; recognition takes also place via the molecules attached to the membrane.
The interest in mimicking membranes exist sine long time ago, with the outlook of taking advantage of membrane functionalities to create nanodevices. For that, different materials can be applied instead of lipids, which lack stability and are difficult to tailor.
In this work amphiphilic block copolymers were used as membrane mimic, to achieve high stability and functionalization. The goal of this thesis was to translate the Nature’s compartmentalization and functionalization concept into synthetic nanometer scale objects. Their functionality was achieved by the use of membrane proteins and DNA.
Specifically, we developed a system to study the effect of polymers on the function and activity of a membrane protein essential for life. In the second case, we created and optimized a polymer-DNA based sensor to detect DNA hybridization.