Rapid discovery power is similar to what gene chips offer biology
The discovery power of the gene chip is coming to nanotechnology. A Northwestern University research team is developing a tool to rapidly test millions and perhaps even billions or more different nanoparticles at one time to zero in on the best particle for a specific use.
When materials are miniaturized, their properties — optical, structural, electrical, mechanical and chemical — change, offering new possibilities. But determining what nanoparticle size and composition are best for a given application, such as catalysts, biodiagnostic labels, pharmaceuticals and electronic devices, is a daunting task.
“As scientists, we’ve only just begun to investigate what materials can be made on the nanoscale,” said Northwestern’s Chad A. Mirkin, a world leader in nanotechnology research and its application, who led the study. “Screening a million potentially useful nanoparticles, for example, could take several lifetimes. Once optimized, our tool will enable researchers to pick the winner much faster than conventional methods. We have the ultimate discovery tool.”
Using a Northwestern technique that deposits materials on a surface, Mirkin and his team figured out how to make combinatorial libraries of nanoparticles in a very controlled way. (A combinatorial library is a collection of systematically varied structures encoded at specific sites on a surface.) Their study will be published June 24 by the journal Science.
The nanoparticle libraries are much like a gene chip, Mirkin says, where thousands of different spots of DNA are used to identify the presence of a disease or toxin. Thousands of reactions can be done simultaneously, providing results in just a few hours. Similarly, Mirkin and his team’s libraries will enable scientists to rapidly make and screen millions to billions of nanoparticles of different compositions and sizes for desirable physical and chemical properties.
“The ability to make libraries of nanoparticles will open a new field of nanocombinatorics, where size — on a scale that matters — and composition become tunable parameters,” Mirkin said. “This is a powerful approach to discovery science.”
Mirkin is the George B. Rathmann Professor of Chemistry in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and founding director of Northwestern’s International Institute for Nanotechnology.
palette of bold colors to an artist who previously had been working with a handful of dull and pale black, white and grey pastels,” said co-author Vinayak P. Dravid, the Abraham Harris Professor of Materials Science and Engineering in the McCormick School of Engineering.
Using five metallic elements — gold, silver, cobalt, copper and nickel — Mirkin and his team developed an array of unique structures by varying every elemental combination. In previous work, the researchers had shown that particle diameter also can be varied deliberately on the 1- to 100-nanometer length scale.
Some of the compositions can be found in nature, but more than half of them have never existed before on Earth. And when pictured using high-powered imaging techniques, the nanoparticles appear like an array of colorful Easter eggs, each compositional element contributing to the palette.
To build the combinatorial libraries, Mirkin and his team used Dip-Pen Nanolithography, a technique developed at Northwestern in 1999, to deposit onto a surface individual polymer “dots,” each loaded with different metal salts of interest. The researchers then heated the polymer dots, reducing the salts to metal atoms and forming a single nanoparticle. The size of the polymer dot can be varied to change the size of the final nanoparticle.
This control of both size and composition of nanoparticles is very important, Mirkin stressed. Having demonstrated control, the researchers used the tool to systematically generate a library of 31 nanostructures using the five different metals.
To help analyze the complex elemental compositions and size/shape of the nanoparticles down to the sub-nanometer scale, the team turned to Dravid, Mirkin’s longtime friend and collaborator. Dravid, founding director of Northwestern’s NUANCE Center, contributed his expertise and the advanced electron microscopes of NUANCE to spatially map the compositional trajectories of the combinatorial nanoparticles.
Now, scientists can begin to study these nanoparticles as well as build other useful combinatorial libraries consisting of billions of structures that subtly differ in size and composition. These structures may become the next materials that power fuel cells, efficiently harvest solar energy and convert it into useful fuels, and catalyze reactions that take low-value feedstocks from the petroleum industry and turn them into high-value products useful in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries.
Read more: Nanoscientists Develop the ‘Ultimate Discovery Tool’
The Latest on: Nanoparticles
[google_news title=”” keyword=”nanoparticles” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]
via Google News
The Latest on: Nanoparticles
- Cow's milk particles unlock one of medicine’s most challenging puzzleson April 26, 2024 at 12:47 am
Cow’s milk contains nanoparticles that can be used to deliver disease-modifying RNA therapy orally, according to a new study. With RNA-based drugs currently only administrable by injection, the ...
- Cerium Oxide Nanoparticle Market worth US$ 5 billion by 2034on April 25, 2024 at 11:47 pm
The cerium oxide nanoparticle market is on a trajectory of substantial growth, with its size forecasted to surge from US$ 805.4 million in 2024 to an impressive US$ 5 billion by 2034. This exponential ...
- Ultrasensitive photonic crystal detects single particles down to 50 nanometerson April 24, 2024 at 12:49 pm
Using an ultrasensitive photonic crystal, TU/e researchers were able to detect single particles down to 50 nanometers in diameter. The new research has just been published in the journal Optica.
- Rice Bran Nanoparticles Could Be a Cheap Anticancer Agenton April 24, 2024 at 12:40 am
In advanced stages of cancer, tissue loss from treatments can be substantial and even fatal. Cutting-edge cancer therapies that employ nanoparticles can specifically target cancer cells, sparing ...
- Study could offer solution for reawakening responses from the immune systemon April 23, 2024 at 5:56 pm
Robert Clarke, PhD, executive director and professor, and Lu Jin, MS, researcher at The Hormel Institute, University of Minnesota, have co-authored a paper recently published in the journal ACS Nano.
- Breakthrough rice bran nanoparticles show promise as affordable and targeted anticancer agenton April 23, 2024 at 10:45 am
Plant-derived nanoparticles have demonstrated significant anticancer effects. Researchers recently developed rice bran-derived nanoparticles (rbNPs) that efficiently suppressed cell proliferation and ...
- Nanoparticles Deliver Drugs Directly Across the Blood-Brain Barrieron April 22, 2024 at 9:02 am
Recent studies published in Nature Communications by an international team of scientists from Michigan State University showed that nanoparticles can traverse the digestive system and deliver ...
- Researchers set new standards for nanoparticles, helping patients with MS, ALS, Parkinson's diseaseon April 19, 2024 at 9:31 am
Is it possible for nanoparticles to go through the digestive system and deliver medicine directly to the brain tissue? Researchers from Michigan State University say yes, and their latest findings are ...
- Metal Nanoparticles Market Size, Latest Trends, Share, Key Players, Revenue, Opportunity, and Forecast to 2024 to 2032on April 16, 2024 at 5:58 pm
Report Ocean recently published a research report titled “Metal Nanoparticles Market” 2024 Forecast to 2032 Analysis by Market Trends.” This study delivers accurate economic projections, worldwide ...
- Scientists solved the 70-year-old mystery of an insect's invisibility coat that can manipulate lighton April 15, 2024 at 10:13 am
A team of researchers created the world's first synthetic brochosomes in a huge step towards invisibility cloaking technology.
via Bing News