 So we had a nano-technology conference and hi, so who are you? Hi, so thank you very much for giving possibility to make this interview. So I am Professor Tiber Yonik from Komenius University in Bragistola. And for this year, by the way, we celebrate 100 years of Komenius University, which was established in 1999. My background is physics and more specifically biophysics. So I finish Moscow, Lubanosev State University and also doing PhD and Doctor of Science there. Currently I am professor at Department of Nuclear Physics and Biophysics at Komenius University. And my current primary interest are biosensors for medical purposes, medical diagnostics, and also for food quality and safety. So what can be maybe interesting for the people is application of biosensors in medical diagnostics, like we are using the specific receptors which are called DNA aptamers, which are single-stranded DNA, which can recognize specific cancer markers at the cancer cells, for example in leukemic cells or in breast cancer cells. And we attach these aptamers to the surface of the electrodes and can recognize by these aptamers the cells in the blood, for example leukemic cells. So in this case it is possible to apply this technology for early diagnostic of the cancers, which is always a big problem, especially for diagnostic of leukemia or breast cancer. So what is the aptamers? The aptamers are artificial nucleic acid, also they are called artificial antibodies. Like artificial antibodies. But in contrast with antibodies which are usually isolated from the animals, the aptamers can be selected by specific chemistry process in the laboratory. So they need not animals and they can be selected in principle against any compounds, for example toxic materials, proteins, cells, etc. So it is quite a new direction in the science which has been started in 1989, but the biosensor technology started actually in 2004-2005. So there was a first biosensors which appears and now this technology is widespread very rapidly, especially for biosensing purpose and also for so-called targeted drug delivery. Especially for treatment of the cancer it is important that the drug, for example some hemotherapeutic drug, is delivered directly to the cancer cells. And for this purpose it should be encapsulated in some nanoparticles, but these nanoparticles can recognize the cancer cells. And for this purpose the aptamers are the perfect object, because if we cover the nanoparticle by aptamers specific to some cancer markers, aptamers can recognize the cancer cells and go inside with these nanoparticles into the cell cytoplasm, which are degraded then, and the chemotherapeutics is released from the nanoparticle and can make direct effect on the cancer cells. So this is new direction. So it's possible to design the aptamer to find only the specific cancer cells? Yes, yes, yes, yes. And this is established science? This is established science. It works very well in laboratory conditions. There start to be some trials on animals. And there is even already the aptamer, the name is macogen, which is used for treatment some problems with eye diseases, like a growing of the vessels in the eye, which cause big problems in the vision. So this is mushroom, macogen is already in the market and it use for treatment of some problems with growing the vessels. So you mentioned 1989, you mentioned just before, were you involved with all this DNA stuff since when? Yes, we started just in 2003, we started with aptamers and we started, it was just first work, focused on using aptamers in biosensors. So it was among the first who developed electrochemical and acoustic biosensor using aptamers for detection of thrombin. So thrombin is very important protease which is in the blood and it is responsible for cleavage of fibrinogen and to form fibrin clots. But if the activity of thrombin, of the concentration is very high, then this is making big problems and thrombosis appear. So it is important to detect the thrombin. So we start with the thrombin detection, then we use the aptamers for example for detection of the prions, proteins, then toxins for example, some mycotoxin in the food. So there is many, many directions which is now using, there is now like an explosion of the papers focusing on using aptamers in biosensing purposes. Were you involved with the DNA sequencing stuff? Is this related? So currently there exist some companies which select aptamers or also there is some groups in the world which select aptamers against different compounds. So in principle you can order aptamers for any drugs you would like or any compounds you would like. So for us it is important to have the sequence and having this sequence you can order these aptamers just for synthesis. There is many companies who synthesize oligonucleotides. What is also possible and what is important is that you should modify these aptamers by some chemical compounds first for making the stability of these aptamers because as soon as aptamers is going in the body, in the blood it is destroyed by endonucleases. But if this is modified by some chemical compounds, for example this can be like amino groups or this can be some thiogrups, this table. Also for detection it is necessary to use some modification. For example if you use electrical sensors you need to modify by some electrically sensitive markers. Whatever you use for example optical detection there should be some specific label which has fluorescence or absorption properties. So this is the interesting direction in the science which is presented particularly also in this conference. So what is the status? There was a lot of talk about DNA sequencing like 20 years ago, 10 years ago. Since when are you involved in this stuff? Is it DNA stuff, everything you talk about? So look, there are two separate topics. One is using these aptamers for diagnostic. Second one is using DNA for making some prognosis of diseases. So as you know the genome project started really about 20 years ago. Now there is a nice technology that in principle each person can have their personal genetic maps which give possibility to predict what DCS is this person can receive and what he should avoid or she should avoid. So it is quite interesting topic which I think has a very nice future because it is so called personalism medicine connected directly with genomic structure and information which is included in DNA. So how far are we from having these cancer treatments that just work? I believe that at this moment mostly there is trials on the animals but I believe that very soon maybe 3-4 years we will have this technology in clinical trials and in direct using. At this moment there is nanoparticles which are used for example magnetic nanoparticles but we are covering by aptamers maybe with antibodies but this is aptamers I think there is a good future for this maybe 3-4 years we will have this technology. And here you had a presentation today? Yes, the second direction of our research is a relation between the academician industry focused on detection of activity of proteins in the milk in general. So I am coordinator of a European project which is the name is Four Milk. And this project is conducting in framework of so called rice coal. This means research and innovation stuff exchange which is supported by the Horizon 2020 program of European Union which is very interesting program which is focused on close collaboration between academia and industry in some practical applications and also on stuff exchange between academic and between industrial partners. So this project is focused on detection of two proteases. One is the plasmin and second is lactase. The plasmin is very important protease which is in milk. This is protein which cleave the caseins. So this is the picture. So this is the typical example of the biosensor. So we have the short peptides at the surface of the gold. And this short peptide has specific cleavage site for the plasmin. So if the plasmin is added, the short peptide is removed and this is observed like decrease of the signal which comes from the ferrocene. This is the specific electrochemical markers. But first let me know a little bit about the plasmin. So plasmin is in the milk and it is quite a complicated system of activation and deactivation of the plasmin. But if the plasmin is very active, then it cleave the casein which is most important proteins in the milk and the plasmin and casein can be observed like the most observed components in the milk. So if the plasmin is very active, the activity is very high, then the plasmin cleave the casein for the short parts and this makes the milk bitter or even cause gallation of the milk which is not desirable for milk producer. But is it okay for cheese? But it's okay for cheese because this can give some specific taste to the cheese. So currently doesn't exist some standard procedure in the milk industry for detection plasmin in the milk. There exist some methods like chromatography for example, but they are very costly and need very specifically educated stuff. So there is necessary to develop some easy method for detection plasmin which can be used for example by small milk dairy companies which can detect the plasmin in daily. So every milk producer needs this, right? Every one. It seems that yes because for example we collaborate we collaborate with some small milk companies so this is another possibility how to detect plasmin using acoustic sensors. So for example in this case the short peptides is immobilized on quartz crystal transducer and cleavage of the plasmin resulted in changes of the resonant frequency of this transducer. So this means if we remove the short peptides by plasmin which cleavage these short peptides then there is decreasing of the mass of the sensing layer and this goes also in increasing of the frequency of oscillations. So it's a very simple approach which can be used directly in milk industry and so we have collaboration with Milk Institute in Hungary together with which we developed the exact method how to now very easily and precisely detect the plasmin. So it's a big deal if you can make it work. Yes. It can change a lot for the dairy industry. Yes, yes, yes. And this is some more information about this. So in principle we already have several publications about this using various methods. So we approve this in laboratory conditions. We also approve this using standard tests like Elyse and it works very well. So now we developed the method how to extract the plasmin from the milk with almost 97% success and it quite works. So now we are in first year of the project. In this project there is several groups. Totally there is 10 partners which working together on this project there is partners from academic field like Restart Center of Natural Science in Budapest, Hungary. There is University College Dublin, Comenius University. We are the coordinators. And then there is two universities in Canada and the United States. So in Toronto University there is a nice laboratory of Professor Mike Thompson who is pitch focus on acoustic sensors. And then there is a nice laboratory for electrochemistry of Professor Joe Wang in University of California, San Diego. And there is excellent Oak Ridge National Laboratory Center for Nanotechnology which help a lot for education of our students and researchers in new nanotechnology methods. And there are companies. There is a small company in Bratislava, Povertec which is focus on construction of small devices for detection of the plasmin using electrochemical methods. Then there is a company in Motion Magyarovar which is focus on the testing of the milk samples and also on education of the people, especially students in the milk, which is making the standard methods of determination of some compounds in the milk. There is also two companies in Ireland. One is focus on development of high-precision ultrasonic spectroscopy for detection proteins in the milk, especially it is focus on detection activity of lactase. So lactase is the enzyme which cleaves lactose. And it is very important because at this moment about 70% of the population is intolerant to lactose which make serious health problems. So it is necessary to find the methods how to prepare lactose-free products, lactose-free milk, like how to optimize this process. And this company is involved in this research. Together with UCD in Dublin. There is also an industrial partner from Dublin. The name is CrossCare. CrossCare is a company which produces lactose-free milk and lactose-free products for infants. And this is directly involved in this project. So we know exactly thanks to this relation between industry and academia. We know what industry needs and industry take from us some new technology like biosensor technology like technical equipment for analysis of the milk in much faster way than this is doing by standard methods. So many students working on this. Yes, yes, many students are involved. So mostly there are PhD students which can participate on these secondments, on these visits. And many young researchers. And this is nanotechnology? So in principle it is nanotechnology because for example by fabrication of the sensor for example plasmin, you need to attach short proteins or cousin on the surface. And it is interesting that you can use various nano-fabrication of the surfaces. For example you can use graphene oxide. You can use for example some dendrimers in order to make the surface much more stable, much more reliable for detection. So nanotechnology is in fabrication of surfaces and the mobilization of some molecules. Alright, thanks a lot. So I guess we could talk a lot about all kinds of stuff with nanotechnology. But thanks for this discussion. Thank you very much Nicolet.