The specific longstanding research goals of the CUNY Macromolecular Assemblies Institute involve basic research with applications primarily to human health, energy transfer, and agriculture. Our faculty-led teams focus on macromolecular targets such as proteins, nucleic acids, lipids, and carbohydrates, with specific goals that include the following:
- to identify and characterize new molecular targets for drug design
- to delineate disease-related macromolecular signals of cellular metabolism
- to understand protein-nucleic acid interactions in animals, plants, and viruses
- to characterize the structure of macromolecular assemblies associated with microbial virulence and cellular resistance to chemotherapy
- to design polymeric biomedical materials for metabolic sensing and drug delivery
- to design self-assembled materials for light harvesting, imaging, and sensor applications
- to identify natural polymer complexes that promote resistance of plants to microbial pathogens and other environmental stresses
- to develop the technological infrastructure to attain these goals
These research goals are pursued using three distinct but related strategies: discovery of structure-function relationships for molecular machines, simulation of macromolecular structures, and bio-inspired design of functionally robust assemblies.