Congratulations Johannes Bintinger!

We are delighted to share that a former Austrian Marshall Plan Foundation Fellow, Dr. Johannes Bintinger, has received a European Research Council Starting Grant to establish his own research group at Linköping University in Sweden.

The ERC-StGs are arguably the most competitive grants in Europe and they allow grantees to focus on a high risk/high gain project through generous funding of 1.5–2 million Euros:
https://erc.europa.eu/apply-grant/starting-grant

Dr. Bintinger is an assistant professor and the principal research engineer at the Department of Science and Technology's Laboratory of Organic Electronics (LOE).

Medical drugs are currently usually given in the form of pills or intravenously, which means that the active substance spreads uncontrolled throughout the body and may cause serious side effects. Furthermore, conventional drug delivery methods can typically administer only one drug at a time, with limited control. But by combining so-called click-to-release chemistry with small ion pumps to precisely control the delivery of multiple drugs simultaneously, Johannes Bintinger aims to find new, efficient methods to treat cancer.

“This technology will enable the delivery of the right doses, at the right place, at the right time with electronic precision. I am really happy that the ERC has granted funding to develop the next generation cancer treatments that, in the long term, can hopefully make a real difference to patients,” he says.

It is called click chemistry because the molecules click together like a belt buckle. But the ‘click’ may also release one molecule from another, in this case a medical drug. Since they are released in the right spot at the right time, more potent drugs, that were previously too dangerous to spread throughout the body, can be used.

 Photo Credit (top): Thor Balkhead

Read more about Dr. Bintinger and his work here.