Enzyme catalysis for sustainable synthesis of conjugated monomers

Conjugated polymers enable sustainable technologies such as organic solar cells, organic thermoelectrics and even water desalination systems. However, the synthesis of conjugated polymers itself is anything but sustainable.

Conjugated monomers, the building blocks for these materials, are obtained via a multistep synthesis route, which is generally done with harmful reagents and solvents, and expensive transition metal catalysts.Science has started to research sustainable synthesis of conjugated monomers, deriving them from renewable feedstock.

To add to this effort, I propose a research project aiming to explore enzymes for conjugated monomer synthesis.

Enzymes are Nature’s incredibly efficient catalysts that have many unexpected catalytic functions, and thus well-suited to develop sustainable synthetic routes for conjugated monomers (and polymers).This project comprises four parts, where we will first identify suitable reaction conditions for our selected enzymes (year 1).

Subsequently, we will focus on enzyme catalysis for the synthesis of aromatic monomers (year 1-2) and perform further functional group modifications with enzymes (year 2-3).

Finally, we want to test multiple enzymes cooperating in one reaction (year 3-4).The goal is to create an enzyme catalysis toolbox for conjugated monomer synthesis, and advance sustainable synthesis of conjugated polymers for high-volume applications such as supercapacitors and thermoelectric modules.