Soft matter and biophysics lab

The Wang group at the School of Chemistry, UNSW Sydney, works at the intersection of physics, chemistry, materials science, to answer questions about soft matter. Soft matter is everything that deforms easily - cell membranes, cream, gels - because internally, the components are held together by weak bonds (on the order of kT). 

Studying soft matter can not only give us insight into the science of the everyday, from personal care products and therapeutics to food, but can also shed light on basic science like the principles behind self-assembly, the physicochemical processes in cells, and how cell-based life started on Earth.

The lab is currently supported by a Human Frontier of Science Program Program Grant (details of grant, with  A/Prof Benjamin Rogers and Dr Yutetsu Kuruma) for a project to make a growing artificial cell with an in vitro transcription/translation system, an ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award to 'Confer life-like functions to protocells', and a Sloan Foundation and Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation grant. 

For more, take a look at the Research themes.