|
|
Dr Giuseppe (Beppe) Battaglia
Chem. Eng."Laurea", PhD, MIoN
The Biocompatibles Lecturer in Bionanotechnology
Course Director of the MSc in Bionanotechnology
Address:
The Kroto Research Institute
North Campus
University of Sheffield
Broad Lane
Sheffield
S3 7HQ
Tel: +44 (0)114 222 5962
Fax: +44 (0)114 222 5945
Email: g.battaglia@sheffield.ac.uk
Giuseppe Battaglia was appointed as Lecturer in Bionanotechnology in February 2006 and as the Biocompatibles Lecturer in Bionanotechnology in February 2008. Prior to joining the department, he completed his PhD in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Sheffield within Professor Anthony Ryan´s research group. Before moving to Sheffield, he graduated in Chemical Engineering at the University of Palermo, Italy, specialising in Macromolecular Biomaterials, he, after, joined the ICI Strategic Technology Group as Research Process Engineer.
Research interests
His research interests focus upon self-assembling polymers in water for the design of functional materials. Specifically, his approach can be divided in two classes:
Intra-aggregate engineering
This approach is based on the molecular design of colloidal polymeric assemblies, such as polymeric vesicles and polymeric micelles for application as delivery systems of bioactive molecules. Polymeric assemblies are engineered introducing functionalities that make them able to target specific biological sites and to change their morphology upon environmental changes such as temperature or pH.
We have recently engineered in collaboration with Prof Armes from the Chemistry department pH sensitive polymer vesicles which is able to delivery efficiently and rapidly almost any kind of molecules within the cell interior without affecting the metabolic activity of the cell. This is particular important in gene delivery and cancer therapy. These involve the collaboration with colleagues from the Medical and Dental School.
|
From left to right, cryogenic electron micrograph of polymer vesicle dispersion, a detail of a single vesicle with its membrane magnified and confocal laser scanning 3D orthonormal projection of human dermal fibroblast cells (nuclei stained in green) after polymer vesicle mediated intracellular delivery of rhodamine (red).
|
Supra-aggregate engineering
This approach is based on the control of the different interactions between polymeric assemblies exploiting them for the formation of supra-aggregates ordered structures such as lyotropic liquid crystals, vesicular gels, polymeric myelins and multilamellar aggregates. This supramolecular-level control is currently studied for engineering devices for applications that range from scaffolds for tissue engineering, artificial muscles, functional materials templating, to the design of controlled nano-machine that can operate at molecular level.
|
From left to right, confocal laser scanning micrographs of different morphologies formed during the evolution of polymer vesicles from lamellar gels.
|
|
Transmission electron micrographs of different mesophases formed by membrane forming copolymers at different water concentrations, from left to right, hexagonally packed vesicles, bicontinuous Im3m phase and inverse hexagonal packed cylinders.
|
Key projects
- Polymersomes for gene delivery (with S. Armes from the Chemistry Dept)
- Polymeric nanovectors for cytosolic delivery
- Study of amphiphilic block copolymer assembly in water
- Nanofunctionalisation of hydrogels for tissue engineering applications (with G. Reilly from the Engineering Materials Dept)
- Development of polymer vesicles with topologically controlled functionalities
- In cellulo characterisation of DNA-binding complexes (with J. Thomas from the Chemistry Dept)
- Investigating the molecular basis of Barrett’s Oesophagus in a 3-D tissue engineered ex-vivo model (with J. Bury and B. Corfe from the Medical School and S. MacNeil from Engineering Materials)
- Polymersomes for targeting Head & Neck cancer (M. Thornhill and C. Murdoch from Clinical Dentistry School and S. MacNeil from Engineering Materials
Professional activities and recognition
Key publications
- Battaglia, G. & Ryan, A. J. Bilayers and Interdigitation in Block Copolymer Vesicles. Journal of the American Chemical Society 127, 8757-8764 (2005).
- Battaglia, G. & Ryan, A. J. The evolution of vesicles from bulk lamellar gels. Nature Materials 4, 869–876 (2005).
- Battaglia, G. & Ryan, A. J. Effect of amphiphile size on the transformation from a lyotropic gel to a vesicular dispersion. Macromolecules, 39, 798-805 (2006).
- Battaglia, G. & Ryan, A. J. Neuron-Like Tubular Membranes Made of Diblock Copolymer Amphiphiles. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 45, 2052-2056 (2006).
- Battaglia, G.; Tomas, S.; Ryan, A. J. Lamellarsomes: metastable polymeric multilamellar aggregates Soft Matter 1, 470 - 475,2007.
- Lomas, H.; Canton, I.; MacNeil, S.; Du, J.; Armes, S. P.; Ryan, A. J.; Lewis, A. L.; Battaglia, G. Biomimetic pH Sensitive Polymersomes for Efficient DNA Encapsulation and Delivery. Advanced Materials 19, 4238–4243, 2007.
- Smart, T.; Lomas, H.; Massignani, M.; Flores-Merino, M. V.; Ruiz-Perez, L.; Battaglia, G. NanoToday 3, (3-4), 38-46, 2008.
Research group
PDRAs
Irene Canton
Caterina Lo Presti
Qizhi Huang (co supervised with J. Bury, B. Corfe, and S. MacNeil)
Nicola Green (co supervised with J. Bury, B. Corfe, and S. MacNeil)
PhD Students
Hannah Lomas
Tom Smart
Marzia Massignani
Miriam Flores Merino (co supervised with G. Reilly)
Martin Gill (co supervised with J. Thomas)
Vanessa Hearnden (co supervised with S. MacNeil, M. Thornhill)
Carla Pegoraro (co supervised with S. MacNeil)
Joy Wayakanon (co supervised with M. Thornhill and C. Murdoch)
Nick Warren (co supervised with S. Armes)
Research centres
Centre for Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering
Polymer Centre
Polymer IRC
|
