ChemE Department Seminar Series: Frank S. Bates

About this event

Please join us for a reception following the talk, from 5-6 p.m. in the Benson Hall Lobby.

Presentation title: Bottlebrush Block Copolymer Prevents Disease Onset in Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy

Abstract: Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a rare genetic disorder that appears in about 3,600 newborn boys in the US annually. This progressive degenerative muscle disease leads to disability and death as the afflicted individual matures to adult age. My colleagues and I have discovered that a bottlebrush (BB) version of poly(ethylene oxide-b-propylene oxide) block copolymer, a variation on commercial compounds known as Poloxamers, has a remarkable effect on genetically modified DMD mice. These results will be discussed in the context of recent studies dealing with the interaction of Poloxamer triblock copolymers with model lipid bilayers and comparison with the new BB diblock compound.

Bio: Frank S. Bates is a Regents Professor and a member of the Chemical Engineering and Materials Science department at the University of Minnesota. He received a B.S. in Mathematics from SUNY Albany and M.S. and Sc.D. degrees in Chemical Engineering from MIT. Between 1982 and 1989 Bates was a member of the technical staff at AT&T Bell Laboratories then joined the University of Minnesota where he served as department Head from 1999 to 2014. He also is a Distinguished Visiting Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of California in Santa Barbara. Bates conducts research on a range of topics related to polymers, including the thermodynamics, dynamics, structure, and properties of block polymers, polymer blends and solutions. He co-founded Valerian Materials in 2015 pursuing sustainable plastics, and Elymus in 2025, which deals with bottlebrush poloxamers. He is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.