Dr. Rienk Eelkema

Rienk's research focuses on interactive organic and polymer materials in aqueous and biological environments. Main activities are in three areas: interactive soft materials using fuel-driven chemical reaction networks, biomolecule labelling, and responsive polymers in biomedical materials. His lab pioneered the use of catalysis to control the kinetics of formation of molecular gels, and the use of chemical fuels to make synthetic active polymers, akin to GTP-driven microtubule polymerization (collaboration with prof. Jan van Esch). His lab is currently focused on the development of signal responsive chemical reaction networks and their incorporation in polymer materials, the application of responsive polymer materials in biomedicine and radiotherapy (collaboration with prof. Antonia Denkova) and protein labeling for sequencing (collaboration with Cees Dekker Lab and Chirlmin Joo Lab).

Academic background

Rienk was born in 1978 near Utrecht, the Netherlands. He completed his undergraduate degree in Chemistry at the University of Groningen in 2001, majoring in organic chemistry (supervisor Prof. Ben L. Feringa). He then obtained his PhD in Chemistry in the same group, studying supramolecular chemistry, stereochemistry and nano- and microscale motion in liquid crystalline systems. After completing postdoctoral work at the University of Oxford with Prof. Harry L. Anderson FRS in the field of nanoscale insulation of molecular wires, he joined the TU Delft Faculty in 2008 and obtained tenure in 2013. He was promoted to Associate Professor in 2017.