IMX Seminar Series - The Plant Age; Materials for the Future

Bringing together the toughness of cellulose nano-fibers from the plant kingdom, the remarkable elasticity and resilience of resilin that enables flees to jump as high as 100 times their height from the insect kingdom combined with Human Recombinant Type I collagen produced in tobacco plants; These are the materials of the future; Nature's Gift. Resilin is a polymeric rubber-like protein secreted by insects to specialized cuticle regions, in areas where high resilience and low stiffness are required. Plant cell walls also present durable composite structures made of cellulose, other polysaccharides, and structural proteins. Plant cell wall composite exhibit extraordinary strength exemplified by their ability to carry the huge mass of some forest trees. Inspired by the remarkable mechanical properties of insect cuticle and plant cell walls we have developed novel composite materials of resilin and Crystalline Nano-Cellulose (resiline-CNC) that display remarkable mechanical properties combining strength and elasticity. Further investigation of CNC films revealed remarkable piezoelectric properties, Chiral Induced Spin Selectivity (CISS), which holds great potential in energy storage, optoelectronics and sustainable electronics.

As a central element of the extracellular matrix, collagen is intimately involved in tissue development, remodeling, and repair and confers high tensile strength to tissues. Numerous medical applications, particularly, wound healing, cell therapy, and bone reconstruction, rely on its supportive and healing qualities. Its synthesis and assembly require a multitude of genes and post-translational modifications.. A tobacco plant expression platform has been recruited to effectively express human collagen, along with three modifying enzymes, critical to collagen maturation. Today in Israel, farmers grow transgenic tobacco plants producing human recombinant collagen that is used for the production of medical implants that are already in clinical use.

Bio: A faculty member of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Prof. Shoseyov’s research is in plant molecular biology protein engineering and nano-biotechnology. His group focus on Bio-Inspired Nanocomposite materials. He has authored or co-authored more than 350 scientific publications and is the inventor or co-inventor of more than 100 patents. Shoseyov is a TED speaker. His talk was translated to 22 languages with more than 1.8 million views: (https://www.ted.com/talks/oded_shoseyov_how_we_re_harnessing_nature_s_hidden_superpowers). Shoseyov is also co-owner and winemaker of BRAVDO winery (http://www.bravdo.co.il/home) named after his mentor, and partner Prof. Ben Ami Bravdo. Prof. Shoseyov received the Outstanding Scientist Polak Award for 2002, the 1999 and 2010 Kay Award for Innovative and Applied Research, The 2012 Israel Prime Minister Citation for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, The 2018 Presidential Award for his contribution to the Economy and Society of Israel. He is the scientific founder of 20 companies.