Assistant Professor Chemistry
	Dow Science Complex 377 989-774-7568 wenjun.du@cmich.edu

Education

Postdoc., Washington University in St. Louis, 2006-2009
Ph.D., University of California – Davis, 2006
M.S., University of North Carolina at Charlotte, 2003
B.S., Sichuan University, 1990

Research Fields

• Chemical syntheses of polysaccharides
• Application of polysaccharides as novel biomaterials for tissue engineering and drug packaging/delivery

Current Research Projects

• Chemical Synthesis of Polysaccharides. Natural polysaccharides are biocompatible and biodegradable; they are ideal biomaterials for tissue engineering and drug delivery. However, several drawbacks such as undefined structure and difficulty to process have limited their potentials in biomedical applications. Synthetic polysaccharides are better alternatives with desired molecular weight and defined structure. In this research, polysaccharides are synthesized through glycosyl iodide mediated glycosylation.
• Construction of polysaccharide nanostructure and drug delivery. A large number of polymeric nanostructures have been constructed for drug delivery purposes. However, most of them do not meet the requirements of biocompatibility and biodegradability for clinical applications. Polysaccharides are naturally biocompatible and biodegradable, they are ideal materials to construct nanostructures for drug delivery.
  

Selected Publications

• Du, W.; Nyström, A. M.; Zhang, L.; Powell, K. T.; Li, Y.; Cheng, C.; Wickline, S. A.; Wooley, K. L., Amphiphilic Hyperbranched Fluoropolymers as Nanoscopic 19F Magnetic Resonance Imaging Agent Assemblies. Biomacromolecules 2008, 9, 2826-2833.
• Du, W.; Xu, Z.; Nyström, A. M.; Zhang, K.; Leonard, J. R.; Wooley, K. L., 19F and Fluorescently-labeled Micelles as Nanoscopic Assemblies for Chemotherapeutic Delivery. Bioconjugate Chem. 2008, 19, 2492–2498.
• Li, Y.; Du, W.; Sun, G.; Wooley, K. L., pH-Responsive Shell Cross-Linked Nanoparticles with Hydrolytically Labile Cross-Links. Macromolecules 2008, 41, 6605-6607.
• Du, W.; Kulkarni, S. S.; Gervay-Hague, J., Efficient, one-pot syntheses of biologically active alpha-linked glycolipids. Chem. Commun. 2007, 2336-2338.
• Natarajan, A.; Du, W.; Xiong, C. Y.; DeNardo, G. L.; DeNardo, S. J.; Gervay-Hague, J., Construction of di-scFv through a trivalent alkyne-azide 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition. Chem. Commun. 2007, 695-697.
• Du, W.; Gervay-Hague, J., Efficient synthesis of alpha-galactosyl ceramide analogues using glycosyl iodide donors. Org. Lett. 2005, 7, 2063-2065.