In this menu item I would like to briefly present some projects in a generally understandable form:
1) How can antibodies be made more compatible?
Antibodies are macromolecules that ensure our survival. Our body produces them to fight substances that damage our body. They are used, for example, as vaccines or to treat chronic diseases. Antibodies used as medicines are produced biotechnologically in bacteria, yeasts or mammalian cells. During this production process, the antibodies, which originally come from humans, are often given a sugar coating that is more similar to the host organism than to humans. This leads to undesirable side effects when these antibodies are used in the human body. In the joint project PROmiGlycan, together with the institution of higher education in Biberach, we want to try to make these patterns more human-like in order to make this group of drugs safer.
2) How can we make cancer drugs better?
We are trying to understand how bleomycins destroy tumors. This drug is one of the top 100 drugs in the world. It has been used for decades in the fight against various cancers such as lymphoma. There is evidence that bleomycins in combination with metal ions destroy the genetic information of tumor cells, so that cancer can be effectively combated in some tumor diseases. However, normal body cells can also be destroyed, which explains the occurrence of side effects. This is where our work in the laboratory / lab comes in. If we succeed in elucidating the details of the mechanism of action of bleomycins, we can use this knowledge to develop better drugs.
3) How can we find out which substances in our water are dangerous?
Together with Landeswasserversorgung Langenau, we are trying to identify substances that are harmful to the environment. We work in the field of effect-related analysis. Here, the water components are separated and then investigated/analyzed for their biological effects. With possibly thousands of substances, this identification is like the proverbial finding of a needle in a haystack. We are trying to develop methods to separate these many substances as efficiently as possible, to evaluate their hazard potential and finally to clarify their identity. Another goal of this work would also be to identify the source of such water hazards.
