The UW Molecular Engineering Ph.D. program celebrated 12 students who successfully defended their theses during the 2023-2024 academic year on May 31, 2024. Faculty, students, and the graduates’ family and friends were in attendance. These MolE Ph.D. graduates conducted interdisciplinary research across eight different departments and organizations.
During the ceremony, Gökçe Altin was awarded the MolES Distinguished Dissertation Award for her publication, “3D printed engineered living materials with genetically programmed mechanical properties and bioproduction performance for the design of functional objects and therapeutic delivery platforms.” A committee of MolES faculty and staff selected her for the award.
Altin worked on developing a class of engineered living materials (ELMs), which combine living cells with polymeric matrices to yield novel materials with programmable functions. The cell platform and polymer network determine the material properties and applications. ELMs have the potential to attain a level of precision, control, responsiveness, and chemical recyclability unachievable with traditional, abiotic materials. Her most impactful contribution to the field thus far is the demonstration of 3D-printed ELMs with bio-augmented mechanical properties. This project was performed with collaborator Hal Alper at the University of Texas, Austin.
In this study, Altin utilized bovine serum albumin (BSA) resin to encapsulate and print engineered E. coli for the in-situ production of L-DOPA (a phytochemical compound belongs to phenolic family) to enhance the mechanical stiffness; naringenin (a phytochemical compound belongs to flavonoid family) production was used to demonstrate an ELM for continuous production of a therapeutic compound and S. cerevisiae was engineered to produce betaxanthin (a phytochemical compound belongs to beta lain family) to afford an ELM that could resist microbial degradation.
“Gökçe demonstrated the potential for this field by 3D printing robust ELM hydrogels as machine parts that can be assembled into mechanically functional nut/bolt and functional gears,” said her advisor, Al Nelson, the MolES director of education, Nist Faculty Fellow, associate chair, and professor of chemistry. “Her findings represent an exciting advancement toward engineered living machines.”
Her work on this was published in March in Advanced Functional Materials. Before arriving at the UW, Altin was a graduate student at Istanbul Technical University, where she studied the chemistry of bioactive compounds, including polyphenols, carotenoids, and fatty acids. She has since joined the faculty at Northeastern University as an assistant professor in the College of Science within the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology.
Congratulations, Gökçe!
More about the 2023-24 MolE graduates' Ph.D. research is posted in Molecular Engineering & Sciences Institute news.