Research

Overview

The Lim Laboratory explores 'Inorganic Life' by investigating how metal ions, small molecules, peptides, and proteins interact within complex biomolecular networks to shape biological function and dysfunction. Drawing on inorganic, organic, and biological chemistry together with neuroscience, we seek to uncover the molecular principles underlying neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, and prion diseases.

Our research focuses on understanding how metal homeostasis and coordination, redox chemistry, oxidative stress and inflammation, protein–protein interactions, and pathological protein phase transitions are interconnected in disease. We are particularly interested in discovering previously unrecognized molecular interactions among endogenous small molecules and neuropeptides, neuron-related proteins, metal ions, and amyloidogenic proteins, and in determining how these interactions reshape their structures, reactivities, aggregation pathways, and biological functions.

Building on these mechanistic insights, we design small-molecule- and protein-based chemical tools that can interrogate and regulate multiple components of pathological networks. Ultimately, we aim to translate fundamental chemical principles into new strategies for the detection, diagnosis, and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases.

Our interdisciplinary research integrates synthetic chemistry (inorganic and organic syntheses), spectroscopic and structural methods (including NMR, EPR, IR, CD, and UV–vis spectroscopies, mass spectrometry, as well as X-ray crystallography), computational approaches, and biochemical and biological studies, ranging from molecular and cellular assays to in vivo investigations using disease models. Through this integrated approach, graduate students and postdoctoral researchers are trained to address complex biological questions from a molecular and chemical perspective.

(Project I)  Deciphering Metal-Directed Molecular Networks in Neurodegenerative Diseases

(Project II)  Chemical Tools for Interrogating and Controlling Metal-Linked Pathological Networks

(Project III)  Multi-Target Chemical Modulators for Pathological Network Regulation

(Project IV)  Bioinspired Metal Complexes and Redox Chemistry for Controlling Oxidative Stress