Engineering for Life Sciences: A Fruitful Collaboration Enabled by Chemistry

Dependency that Unites

Engineers need life sciences because the products they develop are for humans. One example concerns the automotive industry. Since the beginning of the 19th century, it has developed from the curiosity of steam-powered vehicles to today's mass production, which is one of the major pillars of our economic system. Cars are not only sold because of practical considerations, but also for emotional reasons. The enormous impact of customer psychology on the choice of products is also evident for many other of today's high-end products, for instance, in the consumer electronics market. It is therefore not surprising that development of consumer goods devotes a large amount of energy to the exploration and optimization of sensory impressions. Although the exact biological mechanisms of such complex emotional decision-making processes are poorly understood, it seems reasonable that their exploration could lead to novel strategies in product development and marketing: smart surfaces could create optimal touch impressions or bioelectronic noses and other sensors could adjust the odor, acoustics, and climate inside a car to meet the individual needs of the driver. The development of materials and biochemical sensors are typical key domains of chemistry.

But the life sciences also need engineers in order to understand life. The probably most well-known example is the development of the microscope. Since its introduction around 1600, it has opened the doors to modern biology: milestones such as optimized spherically shaped lenses, which enabled the discovery of microorganisms, and the systematic implementation of novel physical principles led to an arsenal of modern confocal, fluorescence, electron, and scanning-probe microscopes. They represent a brilliant piece of advanced engineering sciences, which was always driven by the growing demand for these instruments in biology and medicine. Innumerable routine optical tests in biomedical diagnostics and therapy would be inconceivable today without these devices.

Chemistry Connects Hardware with Life

The role of chemistry in these developments is to connect the engineers’ instrumental hardware with the life scientists’ specimens. In the area of microscopy, this particularly concerns dyes and other labeling reagents, which are particularly important for superresolution microscopy (recognized with the 2014 Nobel Prize in Chemistry). Special light-switchable molecules play an important role for the most effective use of the hardware to enable, for instance, the imaging of intracellular signal cascades in live cells and tissues in real time and with almost molecular resolution.

Another example to illustrate the dependency of biological research on modern engineering concerns the sequencing of nucleic acids. Based on the classical Sanger method, substantial instrumental improvements of this technique, based on fluorescent nucleotide reagents, allowed the sequencing of the human genome to be completed in the early 2000s. However, only the establishment of entirely novel, so-called “next-generation sequencing” methods opened a new age. Engineering was crucial for this breakthrough and contributed highest-resolution single-molecule optics, or micro- and nanofluidics for maximum sample throughput. But chemistry played an essential role by delivering tailored molecules for completely new sequencing approaches based on biochemical synthesis or the translocation through nanopores.

Chemistry Creates Understanding

The further elaboration of these technical systems will revolutionize our understanding of molecular mechanisms of diseases, or the biochemical interactions within the complex organized networks of cells. Today's nearly routine methods of complete genome sequencing, expression and metagenome analysis enable the rapid and exact typing of organisms and inventory of biotic populations. The latter becomes particularly obvious for the currently booming exploration of microbial communities. The so-called microbiome, that is, biofilms comprised of hundreds of different microorganisms that live on and inside higher organisms, substantially contributes to the host's survivability but also to malfunction and the development of diseases. The understanding of the functional and spatiotemporal relations in these complex systems does not only require powerful means to generate and analyze enormous amounts of sequencing data, but also approaches from chemistry. These concern, for instance, activity-based probes and other tools of chemical biology which allow us to translate the flood of technically generated data into meaningful models for biochemistry and systems biology. This interplay will open up new ways for future innovations not only in the biomedical area but also for the conversion and efficient use of raw materials for sustainable production processes and energy supply.

Chemistry Builds Interfaces

The importance of chemical disciplines for the fruitful cooperation of engineering and life sciences is also illustrated by a highly topical subject in medicinal research: The development of modern prostheses and interfaces between machines and muscles, nerves, or the brain. While engineers contribute refined microelectronics and -mechanics and the life sciences supply the basic understanding of physiological processes to this joint venture, chemistry forms the link to realize functional interfaces between technical systems and higher organisms. Distinctive examples include the development of polymer-based biocompatible materials for implants or flexible electronics that can be printed onto tissues with conformal lamination. The latter are of utmost importance for acquiring signals from muscle and nerve tissues, or to feed technically generated signals into living organisms, as is the case for pacemakers or deep-brain stimulation.

The challenges for future advances are exactly here: More precise interfaces between the technical and biological world are required to enable, for instance, paralyzed patients to instruct robotic instrumentation by mere thinking. The functional units of a biological organism, such as individual membrane receptors, have sizes in the lower nanometer length scale, which is hardly addressable by conventional methods in engineering. Chemical methodologies are required to create and implement functional interfaces in this size regime into the technical devices.

Supramolecular Chemistry: Key to Innovation in Biomedical Technology

Supramolecular nanochemistry is the domain that deals with the controlled self-assembly of matter through thermodynamically controlled processes. The fundamental and future-shaping relevance of this research area was emphasized with the award of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Recent approaches go beyond this classical supramolecular chemistry to exploit the self-organization of molecules under non-equilibrium conditions. This aims, for instance, to realize adaptive and responsive materials which could be applied to the steering of cells to control the growth of tissue or suppress pathological conditions. Furthermore, biomolecular self-assembly techniques, such as structural DNA nanotechnology, will contribute to refined biointerfaces between technical and living systems, as they offer high spatial control on the nanometer length scale combined with perfect biocompatibility.

All these examples clearly illustrate that chemistry is the functional link in the liaison between engineers and life scientists. This very successful partnership will further continue to produce essential and innovative solutions for future challenges.