physics

New research center at Brandeis to combine materials science and biology

Adam Nucci — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 13:05:36 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Robert Meyer, Ph.D." onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SP4rm2rwKoI/AAAAAAAAIVU/-ECfkea7PoE/s1600-h/robert_meyer_2.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SP4rm2rwKoI/AAAAAAAAIVU/-ECfkea7PoE/s320/robert_meyer_2.jpg" alt="Robert Meyer, Ph.D." id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5259689361329367682" border="0" //abr /br /Robert Meyer, Ph.D. Professor of Physics, Complex Fluids, Ph.D., Harvard University Email Address: meyer@brandeis.edu Telephone: 781-736-2870 (Office)br /Fax: 781-736-2915 Office: Abelson-Bass-Yalem 216 Homepage: a href="http://nematic.elsie.brandeis.edu/" target="ext"nematic.elsie.brandeis.edu//a/tdtdBrandeis is smallest university to join elite group of universities with a materials research centerbr /br /Waltham, MA—Brandeis University has won a highly competitive $7.8 million grant from the National Science Foundation to establish a Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC). The Center will study the effects of imposing constraints on materials, such as DNA confined in cells and the self-assembly of large arrays of rod-like virus particles, as a guide to engineering semiconductor nano-particles into shapes and forms suitable for applications such as biosensors and solar cells./td/tr/tbody/table"Brandeis has been at the forefront of recent advances in materials science and biology, both in studying the properties of materials occurring in biological systems, and in understanding the role of material properties in the structure and function of cells and cellular components," said principal investigator Robert Meyer, a pioneer in the physics of liquid crystals.br /br /The collaborative, interdisciplinary center will to try to produce a new category of materials known as "active matter." Distinct from normal inert materials such as plastics and steel, active matter can move on its own and exhibits properties previously only observed in living materials, such as muscle and cells.br /br /"In general, we want to understand how biological gadgets are built out of materials, carefully structured and constrained, and from this to learn how to engineer functional bio-mimetic nano-systems for important applications," said Meyer.br /br /The Brandeis center will involve physicists, biochemists, chemists, and biologists in a two-pronged approach to research. In a bottom-up approach, the researchers will explore how the addition of typical biological constraints, such as crowding and confinement, affects materials. For instance, DNA is a long polymer chain, confined to a small volume within a cell. How does this affect the dynamics of this molecule, for instance in division of an e.coli bacterium into two daughter cells? Likewise, the scientists want to understand how tethers added to the DNA in a cell nucleus affect how it can move to carry out important genetic processes.br /br /In a top-down approach, the researchers will explore functioning cellular components, such as cilia, the organelles that miraculously move in synchronization to perform their jobs, such as keeping the lungs clear of pollutants. The researchers will essentially reverse engineer the function and structure of such "biological gadgets."br /br /"Cilia are living machines that we're going to study by a combination of 3D electron microscopy, single particle experimentation, and genetic modification," explained Meyer. "We can genetically modify the structure of cilia, measure those changes with electron microscopy, and correlate them with the resulting changes of mechanical properties and function, as determined by physical experiments on a single cilium."br /br /In constructing the first carefully controllable example of active matter, the center will study actin filaments, which propel themselves through space by getting longer at one end and shorter at the other in a process called tread-milling polymerization.br /br /"How do these moving filaments feel the presence of their neighbors in a large organized array? How do they behave collectively? Are there rules? It's not really clear how these organized systems of self-propelled filaments will behave, but we get hints of some possibilities from observing flocks of birds and schools of fish," said Meyer. "Understanding the rules of behavior of this new kind of matter may help us understand processes like cell motility."br /br /The goals of the new Center include benefits for both biology and materials science. The unique position of Brandeis, in combining just the expertise and technology needed in these two fields with an atmosphere of collaboration and an eagerness to explore uncharted fields, is what won the university this prestigious award, said Meyer.br /br /"More than just a large grant, this puts Brandeis on the world map as one of the leaders in the exciting endeavor of combining physics and chemistry with the life sciences," Meyer said. ###br /br /Contact: Laura Gardner a href="mailto:gardner@brandeis.edu"gardner@brandeis.edu/a 781-736-4204 a href="http://www.brandeis.edu/" target="ext"Brandeis University/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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First 3-D processor runs at 1.4 Ghz on new architecture

Adam Nucci — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 12:04:03 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="184"a title="Eby G. Friedman" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPzTLdidIkI/AAAAAAAAIU0/1Dmbh_WuwT0/s1600-h/eby_g_friedman_2.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPzTLdidIkI/AAAAAAAAIU0/1Dmbh_WuwT0/s320/eby_g_friedman_2.jpg" alt="Eby G. Friedman" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5259310658723062338" border="0" //abr /br /Eby G. Friedman, Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering a href="http://www.rochester.edu/" target="ext"University of Rochester/a Rochester, New York 14627 USA/tdtd'Rochester Cube' points way to more powerful chip designsbr /br /The next major advance in computer processors will likely be the move from today's two-dimensional chips to three-dimensional circuits, and the first three-dimensional synchronization circuitry is now running at 1.4 gigahertz at the University of Rochester.br /br /Unlike past attempts at 3-D chips, the Rochester chip is not simply a number of regular processors stacked on top of one another. It was designed and built specifically to optimize all key processing functions vertically, through multiple layers of processors, the same way ordinary chips optimize functions horizontally. The design means tasks such as synchronicity, power distribution, and long-distance signaling are all fully functioning in three dimensions for the first time./td/tr/tbody/table"I call it a cube now, because it's not just a chip anymore," says Eby Friedman, Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Rochester and faculty director of the pro of the processor. "This is the way computing is going to have to be done in the future. When the chips are flush against each other, they can do things you could never do with a regular 2-D chip."br /br /Friedman, working with engineering student Vasilis Pavlidis, says that many in the integrated circuit industry are talking about the limits of miniaturization, a point at which it will be impossible to pack more chips next to each other and thus limit the capabilities of future processors'. He says a number of integrated circuit designers anticipate someday expanding into the third dimension, stacking transistors on top of each other.br /br /But with vertical expansion will come a host of difficulties, and Friedman says the key is to design a 3-D chip where all the layers interact like a single system. Friedman says getting all three levels of the 3-D chip to act in harmony is like trying to devise a traffic control system for the entire United States—and then layering two more United States above the first and somehow getting every bit of traffic from any point on any level to its destination on any other level—while simultaneously coordinating the traffic of millions of other drivers.br /br /Complicate that by changing the two United States layers to something like China and India where the driving laws and roads are quite different, and the complexity and challenge of designing a single control system to work in any chip begins to become apparent, says Friedman.br /br /Since each layer could be a different processor with a different function, such as converting MP3 files to audio or detecting light for a digital camera, Friedman says that the 3-D chip is essentially an entire circuit board folded up into a tiny package. He says the chips inside something like an iPod could be compacted to a tenth their current size with ten times the speed.br /br /What makes it all possible is the architecture Friedman and his students designed, which uses many of the tricks of regular processors, but also accounts for different impedances that might occur from chip to chip, different operating speeds, and different power requirements. The fabrication of the chip is unique as well. Manufactured at MIT, the chip must have millions of holes drilled into the insulation that separates the layers in order to allow for the myriad vertical connections between transistors in different layers.br /br /"Are we going to hit a point where we can't scale integrated circuits any smaller? Horizontally, yes," says Friedman. "But we're going to start scaling vertically, and that will never end. At least not in my lifetime. Talk to my grandchildren about that."br /br /The next major advance in computer processors will likely be the move from today's two-dimensional chips to three-dimensional circuits, and the first three-dimensional synchronization circuitry is now running at 1.4 gigahertz at the University of Rochester.br /br /Unlike past attempts at 3-D chips, the Rochester chip is not simply a number of regular processors stacked on top of one another. It was designed and built specifically to optimize all key processing functions vertically, through multiple layers of processors, the same way ordinary chips optimize functions horizontally. The design means tasks such as synchronicity, power distribution, and long-distance signaling are all fully functioning in three dimensions for the first time.br /br /"I call it a cube now, because it's not just a chip anymore," says Eby Friedman, Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Rochester and faculty director of the pro of the processor. "This is the way computing is going to have to be done in the future. When the chips are flush against each other, they can do things you could never do with a regular 2-D chip."br /br /Friedman, working with engineering student Vasilis Pavlidis, says that many in the integrated circuit industry are talking about the limits of miniaturization, a point at which it will be impossible to pack more chips next to each other and thus limit the capabilities of future processors'. He says a number of integrated circuit designers anticipate someday expanding into the third dimension, stacking transistors on top of each other.br /br /But with vertical expansion will come a host of difficulties, and Friedman says the key is to design a 3-D chip where all the layers interact like a single system. Friedman says getting all three levels of the 3-D chip to act in harmony is like trying to devise a traffic control system for the entire United States—and then layering two more United States above the first and somehow getting every bit of traffic from any point on any level to its destination on any other level—while simultaneously coordinating the traffic of millions of other drivers.br /br /Complicate that by changing the two United States layers to something like China and India where the driving laws and roads are quite different, and the complexity and challenge of designing a single control system to work in any chip begins to become apparent, says Friedman.br /br /Since each layer could be a different processor with a different function, such as converting MP3 files to audio or detecting light for a digital camera, Friedman says that the 3-D chip is essentially an entire circuit board folded up into a tiny package. He says the chips inside something like an iPod could be compacted to a tenth their current size with ten times the speed.br /br /What makes it all possible is the architecture Friedman and his students designed, which uses many of the tricks of regular processors, but also accounts for different impedances that might occur from chip to chip, different operating speeds, and different power requirements. The fabrication of the chip is unique as well. Manufactured at MIT, the chip must have millions of holes drilled into the insulation that separates the layers in order to allow for the myriad vertical connections between transistors in different layers.br /br /"Are we going to hit a point where we can't scale integrated circuits any smaller? Horizontally, yes," says Friedman. "But we're going to start scaling vertically, and that will never end. At least not in my lifetime. Talk to my grandchildren about that." ###br /br /About the University of Rochester: The University of Rochester (a href="http://www.eurekalert.org/www.rochester.edu" target="ext"www.rochester.edu/a) is one of the nation's leading private universities. Located in Rochester, N.Y., the University gives students exceptional opportunities for interdisciplinary study and close collaboration with faculty through its unique cluster-based curriculum. Its College of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering is complemented by the Eastman School of Music, Simon School of Business, Warner School of Education, Laboratory for Laser Energetics, Schools of Medicine and Nursing, and the Memorial Art Gallery.br /br /Contact: Jonathan Sherwood a href="mailto:jonathan.sherwood@rochester.edu"jonathan.sherwood@rochester.edu/a 585-273-4726 a href="http://www.rochester.edu/" target="ext"University of Rochester/a
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Old and new therapies combine to tackle atherosclerosis

Adam Nucci — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 10:18:58 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="258"a title="Atherosclerosis in an artery (B)" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPtpiD9VWeI/AAAAAAAAIUc/9dxWcZHU7-I/s1600-h/nano_atherosclerosis.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPtpiD9VWeI/AAAAAAAAIUc/9dxWcZHU7-I/s320/nano_atherosclerosis.jpg" alt="Atherosclerosis in an artery (B)" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5258913023784212962" border="0" //abr /br /Image from What is Atherosclerosis, courtesy of National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Atherosclerosis in an artery (B/tdtdFuturistic nanotechnology has been teamed with a decades-old drug to beat atherosclerotic plaques in research conducted at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.br /br /The scientists have found that drug-laced nanoparticles plus a statin could stop the growth of tiny blood vessels that feed arterial plaques. Their results suggest that the dual treatment also prevents the vessels from restarting their growth, which could shrink or stabilize plaques. Although the data were obtained in tests on rabbits, they raise hope that a similar approach could help human patients with atherosclerosis./td/tr/tbody/tableThe nanoparticles — minute spheres about 20,000 times smaller than the diameter of a straight pin — were coated with a substance that made them stick in growing blood vessels and with fumagillin, a potent compound that stops blood vessel growth.br /br /"We saw that statins sustain the acute inhibition of blood vessel growth produced by the fumagillin nanoparticles within the plaque," says senior author Gregory Lanza, M.D., Ph.D., a Washington University cardiologist at Barnes Jewish Hospital.br /br /Lanza and co-senior author Samuel A. Wickline, M.D., published these results in the September issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology: Cardiovascular Imaging. Patrick M. Winter, Ph.D., research assistant professor of medicine, was the lead author of the study. Lanza is professor of medicine and biomedical engineering. Wickline is professor of medicine, physics, biomedical engineering and cell biology and physiology.br /br /Patients with atherosclerosis often take statins to lower cholesterol. Statins also decrease atherosclerotic plaque progression by modestly inhibiting proliferation of new vessels (neovessels) within plaques. These neovessels provide increased blood and oxygen to cells in actively developing plaques. Because of their high fragility, neovessels often rupture, leading to local hemorrhages that greatly accelerate the disease process. Fumagillin nanoparticles could be used to further inhibit the development of new vessel treatment in high-risk patients, Lanza says.br /br /"Our past research showed that fumagillin nanoparticles reduced blood vessel formation at the site of arterial plaques in experimental rabbits after one week," says Lanza. "In this study, we tested how long that effect lasts and if it could be extended by statins."br /br /The rabbits used in the study ate a high-fat diet that caused arterial plaques. The researchers detected new blood vessel buildup at the site of plaques by coating nanoparticles that were targeted to neovessels with an MRI contrast agent.br /br /When the rabbits received a single dose of blood-vessel-targeted nanoparticles that also carried fumagillin, the researchers saw that the amount of MRI signal at the sites of plaques decreased about five-fold by the end of one week. But a high MRI signal returned by the fourth week, indicating that plaques were active again.br /br /Because repeated injections of fumagillin nanoparticles is impractical for treating human patients, the researchers looked for a way to extend the initial effectiveness.br /br /Atherosclerotic rabbits that got daily doses of the statin atorvastatin (brand name Lipotor) had no change in plaque angiogenesis measured by MRI. When the statin and the fumagillin nanoparticles were started at the same time, the atorvastatin had no additional benefits over the targeted therapy.br /br /However, when the statin had been given for at least one month prior to the fumagillin treatment, the five-fold reduction in MRI signal due to diminished neovessels was maintained for four weeks.br /br /Lanza says that the results suggest that one or possibly two injections of nanoparticles in patients who are already on statins could lead to a long-term reduction in plaque activity and prolonged plaque stability. The results also illustrate the potential clinical use of MRI molecular imaging with the neovessel-targeted nanoparticles to measure plaque status in high-risk patients before clinical symptoms appear.br /br /The nanoparticle technology permits potent therapeutics to be effective at minute doses by targeting them directly to the disease site. Moreover, the MRI molecular imaging with the nanoparticles could be used to noninvasively monitor and manage the response to treatment and the progression of atherosclerotic disease.br /br /"Because nearly half of patients experiencing their first heart attack die soon after, our goal is to prevent or greatly delay clinically significant atherosclerotic disease," Lanza says. "We hope to achieve this by a personalized nanomedicine approach that risk-stratifies patients and affords safe, targeted delivery of potent compounds that block progression in high-risk patients. This would be followed by management of the disease with standard-of-care drugs and periodic MRI monitoring of disease progression. We plan to conduct clinical trials to test this idea."br /br /###br /br /Winter PM, Caruthers SD, Williams TA, Wickline SA, Lanza GM. Antiangiogenic synergism of integrin-targeted fumagillin nanoparticles and atorvastatin in atherosclerosis. Journal of the American College of Cardiology: Cardiovascular Imaging, Sept. 15, 2008.br /br /Funding from the National Cancer Institute, the National Hearth Lung and Blood Institute, the National Institute for Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, Philips Medical Systems and Philips Research supported this research.br /br /Washington University School of Medicine's 2,100 employed and volunteer faculty physicians also are the medical staff of Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals. The School of Medicine is one of the leading medical research, teaching and patient care institutions in the nation, currently ranked third in the nation by U.S. News amp; World Report. Through its affiliations with Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals, the School of Medicine is linked to BJC HealthCare.br /br /Contact: Gwen Ericson a href="mailto:ericsong@wustl.edu"ericsong@wustl.edu/a 314-286-0141 a href="http://www.medicine.wustl.edu/" target="ext"Washington University School of Medicine/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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Researchers develop nano-sized 'cargo ships' to target and destroy tumors VIDEO

Adam Nucci — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 14:19:13 -0700

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/tdtdScientists have developed nanometer-sized 'cargo ships' that can sail throughout the body via the bloodstream without immediate detection from the body's immune radar system and ferry their cargo of anti-cancer drugs and markers into tumors that might otherwise go untreated or undetected./td/tr/tbody/tableIn a forthcoming issue of the Germany-based chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie, scientists at UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara and MIT report that their nano-cargo-ship system integrates therapeutic and diagnostic functions into a single device that avoids rapid removal by the body's natural immune system.br /br /tabletbodytrtd"The idea involves encapsulating imaging agents and drugs into a protective 'mother ship' that evades the natural processes that normally would remove these payloads if they were unprotected," said Michael Sailor, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UCSD who headed the team of chemists, biologists and engineers that turned the fanciful concept into reality. "These mother ships are only 50 nanometers in diameter, or 1,000 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair, and are equipped with an array of molecules on their surfaces that enable them to find and penetrate tumor cells in the body."br /br /These microscopic cargo ships could one day provide the means to more effectively deliver toxic anti-cancer drugs to tumors in high concentrations without negatively impacting other parts of the body./tdtd width="242"a title="Ji-Ho Park, University of California - San Diego" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPpJWQUWcAI/AAAAAAAAIT0/_PrepQG416M/s1600-h/nano_sized_1.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPpJWQUWcAI/AAAAAAAAIT0/_PrepQG416M/s320/nano_sized_1.jpg" alt="Ji-Ho Park, University of California - San Diego" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5258596161594748930" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: UCSD graduate student Ji-Ho Park holds a vial containing the nanometer-sized cargo ships, composed of a magnetic nanoparticle, a fluorescent quantum dot and an anti-cancer drug molecule that will be left on the site of the tumor.br /br /Credit: Luo Gu, UCSD. Usage Restrictions: None./td/tr/tbody/table"Many drugs look promising in the laboratory, but fail in humans because they do not reach the diseased tissue in time or at concentrations high enough to be effective," said Sangeeta Bhatia, a physician, bioengineer and professor of Health Sciences and Technology at MIT who played a key role in the development. "These drugs don't have the capability to avoid the body's natural defenses or to discriminate their intended targets from healthy tissues. In addition, we lack the tools to detect diseases such as cancer at the earliest stages of development, when therapies can be most effective."tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Nanometer-Sized Cargo Ships Illustration" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPpOl3pWigI/AAAAAAAAIT8/H_y1laH7oXw/s1600-h/nano_sized_2.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPpOl3pWigI/AAAAAAAAIT8/H_y1laH7oXw/s320/nano_sized_2.jpg" alt="Nanometer-Sized Cargo Ships Illustration" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5258601927407995394" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: The nanometer-sized cargo ships look individually like a chocolate-covered nut cluster, in which a biocompatible lipid forms the chocolate shell and magnetic nanoparticles, quantum dots and the drug doxorubicin are the nuts.br /br /Credit: Ji-Ho Park, UCSD. Usage Restrictions: None./tdtdThe researchers designed the hull of the ships to evade detection by constructing them of specially modified lipids--a primary component of the surface of natural cells. The lipids were modified in such a way as to enable them to circulate in the bloodstream for many hours before being eliminated. This was demonstrated by the researchers in a series of experiments with mice.br /br /The researchers also designed the material of the hull to be strong enough to prevent accidental release of its cargo while circulating through the bloodstream./td/tr/tbody/table Tethered to the surface of the hull is a protein called F3, a molecule that sticks to cancer cells. Prepared in the laboratory of Erkki Ruoslahti, a cell biologist and professor at the Burnham Institute for Medical Research at UC Santa Barbara, F3 was engineered to specifically home in on tumor cell surfaces and then transport itself into their nuclei.br /br /"We are now constructing the next generation of smart tumor-targeting nanodevices," said Ruoslahti. "We hope that these devices will improve the diagnostic imaging of cancer and allow pinpoint targeting of treatments into cancerous tumors."br /br /The researchers loaded their ships with three payloads before injecting them in the mice. Two types of nanoparticles, superparamagnetic iron oxide and fluorescent quantum dots, were placed in the ship's cargo hold, along with the anti-cancer drug doxorubicin. The iron oxide nanoparticles allow the ships to show up in a Magnetic Resonance Imaging, or MRI, scan, while the quantum dots can be seen with another type of imaging tool, a fluorescence scanner.br /br /"The fluorescence image provides higher resolution than MRI," said Sailor. "One can imagine a surgeon identifying the specific location of a tumor in the body before surgery with an MRI scan, then using fluorescence imaging to find and remove all parts of the tumor during the operation."br /br /The team found to its surprise in its experiments that a single mother-ship can carry multiple iron oxide nanoparticles, which increases their brightness in the MRI image.br /br /"The ability of these nanostructures to carry more than one superparamagnetic nanoparticle makes them easier to see by MRI, which should translate to earlier detection of smaller tumors," said Sailor. "The fact that the ships can carry very dissimilar payloads—a magnetic nanoparticle, a fluorescent quantum dot, and a small molecule drug—was a real surprise."br /br /The researchers noted that the construction of so-called "hybrid nanosystems" that contain multiple different types of nanoparticles is being explored by several other research groups. While hybrids have been used for various laboratory applications outside of living systems, said Sailor, there are limited studies done in vivo, or within live organisms, particularly for cancer imaging and therapy.br /br /"That's because of the poor stability and short circulation times within the blood generally observed for these more complicated nanostructures," he added. As a result, the latest study is unique in one important way.br /br /"This study provides the first example of a single nanomaterial used for simultaneous drug delivery and multimode imaging of diseased tissue in a live animal," said Ji-Ho Park, a graduate student in Sailor's laboratory who was part of the team. Geoffrey von Maltzahn, a graduate student working in Bhatia's laboratory, was also involved in the project, which was financed by a grant from the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health.br /br /The nano mother ships look individually like a chocolate-covered nut cluster, in which a biocompatible lipid forms the chocolate shell and magnetic nanoparticles, quantum dots and the drug doxorubicin are the nuts. They sail through the bloodstream in groups that, under the electron microscope, look like small, broken strands of pearls.br /br /The researchers are now working on developing ways to chemically treat the exteriors of the nano ships with specific chemical "zip codes," that will allow them to be delivered to specific tumors, organs and other sites in the body. ###br /br /Contact: Kim McDonald a href="mailto:kimmcdonald@ucsd.edu"kimmcdonald@ucsd.edu/a 858-534-7572 a href="http://www.ucsd.edu/" target="ext"University of California - San Diego/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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A snapshot of the transformation

Adam Nucci — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 14:36:47 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="dynamic transmission electron microscope" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPkDaSHndUI/AAAAAAAAITk/bAUAnYSw5RQ/s1600-h/nano_snapshot.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPkDaSHndUI/AAAAAAAAITk/bAUAnYSw5RQ/s320/nano_snapshot.jpg" alt="dynamic transmission electron microscope" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5258237790007031106" border="0" //abr /br /From left: Curtis Brown, Thomas LaGrange and Judy Kim make adjustments to the dynamic transmission electron microscope.Photo by Marcia Johnson/LLNL /tdtdLIVERMORE, Calif. - Researchers have achieved a milestone in materials science and electron microscopy by taking a high-resolution snapshot of the transformation of nanoscale structures.br /br /Using the Lab's Dynamic Transmission Electron Microscope (DTEM), Judy Kim and colleagues peered into the microstructure and properties of reactive multilayer foils (also known as nanolaminates) with 15-nanosecond-scale resolution./td/tr/tbody/table"This is the first time that a detailed study of these reactive nanolaminates has exposed what is happening in the self-propagating high-temperature synthesis zone," Kim said.br /br /Time-resolved images of nanolaminates show a brief change in structure with a short cellular phase separation during cooling.br /br /Observing short-lived behavior - how a chemical reaction, structural deformation or phase transformation occurs - is not easy, but is key to understanding many of the basic phenomena at the heart of chemistry, biology and materials science. The ability to directly observe and characterize these complex events leads to a fundamental understanding of properties such as reactivity, stability and strength, and helps in the design of new and improved materials and devices.br /br /Transmission electron microscopy has evolved dramatically in recent years and can spatially resolve microstructural details of phase and structure, but it can't collect at times less than a millisecond.br /br /That's where Livermore's DTEM comes in. It provides scientists with the ability to image transient behavior with an unprecedented combination of spatial and temporal resolution: nanometers and nanoseconds.br /br /"Direct real-space observations of phase transformations on the nanosecond scale have allowed us to relate the formation mechanism in reactive multilayer foils to binary alloy solidification," Kim said. "This conclusion is based upon transient features that could not have been found using any other technique."br /br /Because the team needed access to time and real-space that is impossible to study using traditional methods such as conventional in situ TEM (limited to video rates) or ultrafast diffraction (which presently lacks direct real-space imaging capabilities), the DTEM fit the bill.br /br /"The ability to determine not only crystal structure, but also morphological evolution of dynamic events on the nanoscale has far-reaching implications for the study of materials science, non-equilibrium processes and the behavior of matter on very fine scales of length and time," Kim said.br /br /Multilayer foils are layers of reactant materials that undergo exothermic, self-propagating reactions when layer mixing is caused by an external energy source. The foils show mobile, high-temperature reaction zones where atoms of adjoining layers diffuse across the interfaces. They are used as customized heat sources for rapid fuses, biological neutralization and joining materials via localized heating rather than global device heating. ###br /br /Other Livermore researchers include: Thomas LaGrange, Bryan Reed, Mitra Taheri, Michael Armstrong, Wayne King, Nigel Browning and Geoffrey Campbell.br /br /The research appears in the Sept. 12 edition of the journal Science.br /br /Founded in 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (https://www.llnl.gov) is a national security laboratory, with a mission to ensure national security and apply science and technology to the important issues of our time. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is managed by Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.br /br /Contact: Anne Stark a href="mailto:stark8@llnl.gov"stark8@llnl.gov/a 925-422-9799 a href="http://www.llnl.gov/" target="ext"DOE/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory/a
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Computational biochemist uncovers a molecular clue to evolution

Adam Nucci — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 12:29:31 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Professor Wei Yang" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPeTznOUWtI/AAAAAAAAITM/1r673yZ43eg/s1600-h/nano_wei_yang.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPeTznOUWtI/AAAAAAAAITM/1r673yZ43eg/s320/nano_wei_yang.jpg" alt="Professor Wei Yang" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5257833604889991890" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: FSU Chemistry and Biochemistry Professor Wei Yang, left, and Donghong Min, a postdoctoral associate in the Institute of Molecular Physics, produced computer simulations showing evidence of biological evolution at work on the molecular level.br /br /Credit: Michele Edmunds/FSU Photo Lab. Usage Restrictions: None./tdtdTALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A Florida State University researcher who uses high-powered computers to map the workings of proteins has uncovered a mechanism that gives scientists a better understanding of how evolution occurs at the molecular level.br /br /Such an understanding eventually could lead to the development of new and more effective antiparasitic drugs.br /br /Wei Yang is an assistant professor in FSU's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and a faculty member in the university's Institute of molecular biophysics./td/tr/tbody/table Working with colleagues from FSU, Duke University and Brandeis University, he recently produced remarkable computer models of an enzyme that carries the unwieldy name of inosine monophosphate dehrydrogenase, or IMPDH for short. IMPDH is responsible for initiating certain metabolic processes in DNA and RNA, enabling the biological system to reproduce quickly.br /br /"In creating these simulations of IMPDH, we observed something that hadn't been seen before," Yang said. "Previously, enzymes were believed to have a single 'pathway' through which they deliver catalytic agents to biological cells in order to bring about metabolic changes. But with IMPDH, we determined that there was a second pathway that also was used to cause these chemical transformations. The second pathway didn't operate as efficiently as the first one, but it was active nevertheless."br /br /Why would an enzyme have two pathways dedicated to the same task? Yang and his colleagues believe that the slower pathway is an evolutionary vestige left over from an ancient enzyme that evolved over eons into modern-day IMPDH.br /br /The finding is significant for several reasons, Yang said.br /br /"First of all, this offers a rare glimpse of evolutionary processes at work on the molecular level," Yang said. "Typically when we talk about evolution, we're referring to a process of adaptation that occurs in a population of organisms over an extended period of time. Our research examines such adaptations at the most basic level, which helps scientists to develop a fuller picture of how evolution actually occurs.br /br /"This also represents a big step forward in our efforts to create computational simulations of biological processes," Yang said. "In this case, we first made a prediction of the enzyme structure via computer and later verified it through direct observation in a laboratory, rather than the other way around. This is a most unusual accomplishment, and one that indicates we are becoming more advanced in our ability to answer questions relating to biological functions at the molecular level."br /br /"Because of the key role that IMPDH plays, scientists have focused on developing new antiparasitic drugs that target it," Yang said. "Our research will certainly contribute to this process."br /br /Joseph Schlenoff, the chairman of FSU's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, praised Yang's computational methods as "extremely powerful because they are rigorous, make few assumptions and approximate the complexity of the real world. The accurate predictions that result represent success that has been promised to us for so long by scientists using computers."br /br /Collaborating with Yang on the project were Gavin J.P. Naylor, an associate professor in FSU's Department of Scientific Computing; Donghong Min, a postdoctoral associate in the Institute of Molecular Physics; Hongzhi Li, a former postdoc in the Institute of Molecular Physics; Clemens Lakner, a graduate assistant in the Department of Biological Science; David Swofford, a research scientist at Duke University and former FSU faculty member; Lizbeth Hedstrom, a professor of biochemistry at Brandeis University; and postdocs Helen R. Josephine and Iaian S. MacPherson, both of Brandeis.br /br /Together the researchers wrote about their findings in a paper, "An Enzymatic Atavist Revealed in Dual Pathways for Water Activation," that was published this summer in PLoS Biology, a peer-reviewed, open-access journal published by the Public Library of Science. Visit a href="http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-documentamp;doi=10.1371/journal.pbio.0060206" target="ext"embiology.plosjournals.org/perlserv//em/a to read the paper.br /br /Dan Herschlag, a professor of biochemistry at Stanford University, edited the paper for PLoS Biology. He praised it for its innovative approach.br /br /"This work reveals basic aspects of how enzymes work and how they have evolved," Herschlag said. "The study melds experiment and computation in a powerful fashion and represents a model for how to use interdisciplinary research to answer important questions." ###br /br /Contact: Wei Yang a href="mailto:yang@sb.fsu.edu"yang@sb.fsu.edu/a 850-645-6884 a href="http://www.fsu.edu/" target="ext"Florida State University/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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Scientists form alliance to develop nanotoxicology protocols

Adam Nucci — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 14:21:09 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="240"a title="Mark Wiesner" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPZasYd8Y2I/AAAAAAAAIS8/irWcRh-fsyU/s1600-h/mark_wiesner_2.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPZasYd8Y2I/AAAAAAAAIS8/irWcRh-fsyU/s320/mark_wiesner_2.jpg" alt="Mark Wiesner" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5257489333530420066" border="0" //abr /br /Mark R. Wiesner, Wiesner's research interests include membrane processes, nanostructured materials, transport and fate of nanomaterials in the environment, colloidal and interfacial processes, and environmental systems analysis.br /br /Contact via a href="mailto:email" style="color: rgb(0, 141, 199); text-decoration: underline;"wiesner@duke.edu/a or (919) 660-5292 (office phone) Visit via. a style="color: rgb(0, 141, 199); text-decoration: underline;" href="http://wiesner.cee.duke.edu/" target="ext"wiesner.cee.duke.edu/a or 120 Hudson Hall (office location)/tdtdInternational group addresses lack of consensus on test proceduresbr /br /ZÜRICH, Switzerland (September 9, 2008) A team of materials scientists and toxicologists announced the formation of a new international research alliance to establish protocols for reproducible toxicological testing of nanomaterials in both cultured cells and animals. The International Alliance for NanoEHS Harmonization (IANH) was unveiled today at Nanotox 2008, one of the world's largest biennial nanotoxicological research meetings.br /br /“When this team of scientists from Europe, the U.S., and Japan are able to get the same results for interactions of nanomaterials with biological organisms, then science and society can have higher confidence in the safety of these materials,” said Kenneth Dawson, of University College Dublin and current chair of the IANH team.br /br /Nanotechnology provides the opportunity for enabling new products that could meet a wide range of societal needs, but concerns over potential environmental, health and safety impacts of these materials may limit their adoption./td/tr/tbody/table Multiple organizations including the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the International Nanotechnology Conference for Communication and Cooperation (INC) have highlighted the importance of international collaboration to accelerate understanding of nanotechnology implications for society. This alliance, IANH, was established by leading materials and toxicological researchers to address this need.br /br /Although Andrew Maynard, a leading nanotoxicologist, is not a member of this alliance, he sees the need for this effort. "This initiative is a major step toward ensuring hazard evaluations of emerging nanomaterials that are both relevant and reproducible," said Andrew Maynard, Chief Scientist, Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC.br /br /The IANH team includes researchers from Germany: Wolfgang Kreyling of Helmholtz Institute; from Ireland: Kenneth Dawson of University College Dublin; from Japan: Gaku Ichihara of Nagoya University, and Kun’ichi Miyazawa of the National Institute for Materials Science; from Switzerland: Harald Krug of the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research (EMPA); from the United Kingdom: Vicki Stone of Napier University; from the United States of America: Vince Castranova, Mark Hoover, Dale Porter, and Aleksandr Stefaniak of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Vicki Colvin of Rice University; Fred Klaessig; Andre’ Nel of the University of California at Los Angeles; Günter Oberdörster and Alison Elder of the University of Rochester; and Mark Wiesner of Duke University.br /br /Others collaborating with this alliance include from the European Union Joint Research Centre: Gert Roebben and Hendrik Emons of the Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements. From the United States of America, Vince Hackley of the National Institute of Standards and Technology; and Scott McNeil of the Nanotechnology Characterization Laboratory at the National Cancer Institute are also collaborating with the alliance.br /br /Previous studies have identified key gaps in scientific knowledge regarding the biological interactions with nanoparticles and subsequent toxicological responses. Progress in resolving these issues is limited by the lack of testing protocols that enable reproducible assessment of the biological interactions of nanoparticles with cells and animals, and the lack of correlations between interactions observed in cells and in animals. IANH is being formed to establish testing protocols that enable reproducible toxicological testing of nanomaterials at the cell and animal levels and to start developing correlations between these two systems.br /br /IANH members have agreed to develop specific tools and testing protocols and to perform a set of round robin experiments to lay the foundation for reproducible testing of nanomaterial biological interactions and toxicology. The alliance will establish protocols that can be shared with other researchers and foster experiments to evaluate correlations between in vitro testing and toxicological interactions in mammals and aquatic animals. These reproducible nano-biological testing protocols should enable better assessment of potential biological interactions of nanomaterials and improve correlations between in vitro testing and outcomes in animals, humans and the environment.br /br /This effort was encouraged by the United States National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration activities (FP7), and the Japanese National Institute for Materials Science. ###br /br /For more information on this press release, contact: ulliEurope: Iseult Lynch, Tel. +353 87 252 0073, a href="mailto:iseult@fiachra.ucd.ie"iseult@fiachra.ucd.ie/a/liliAmericas: Vicki Colvin, Tel. 1 713 348 5741 a href="mailto:colvin@rice.edu"colvin@rice.edu/a/liliAndre’ Nel, Tel. 1 310-825-6620 a href="mailto:anel@mednet.ucla.edu"anel@mednet.ucla.edu/a/liliGünter Oberdörster, Tel. 1 585 275 3804 a href="mailto:Gunter_Oberdorster@URMC.Rochester.edu"Gunter_Oberdorster@URMC.Rochester.edu/a/liliMark Wiesner, Tel. 1 919 660 5292, a href="mailto:wiesner@duke.edu"wiesner@duke.edu/a/liliJapan amp; Asia: Masahiro Takemura, Tel. +81 (29) 859-2402, a href="mailto:TAKEMURA.Masahiro@nims.go.jp"TAKEMURA.Masahiro@nims.go.jp/a/li/ulMore information about the International Alliance for NanoEHS Harmonization, including the detailed list of participants, study materials, and experiments can be found at the following web site: a href="http://www.nanoehsalliance.org/" target="ext"www.nanoehsalliance.org/abr /br /Contact: Mark Wiesner a href="mailto:wiesner@duke.edu"wiesner@duke.edu/a 919-660-5292 a href="http://www.duke.edu/" target="ext"Duke University/a
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Production of gold nanorods without the use of cytotoxic additives

Adam Nucci — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 06:46:36 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Gold Nanorods" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPSgM3EFn8I/AAAAAAAAISU/V4E6UkTLCog/s1600-h/nano_gold_nanorods.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPSgM3EFn8I/AAAAAAAAISU/V4E6UkTLCog/s320/nano_gold_nanorods.jpg" alt="Gold Nanorods" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5257002807848181698" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: M. Bockstaller and his team have synthesized gold nanorods using an ionic liquid as a solvent. Gold nanorods are interesting starting materials in cancer therapy.br /br /Credit: (C) Wiley-VCH 2008. Usage Restrictions: Permission to use with appropriate credit and link to a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/anie.200802185" target="ext"Wiley InterScience :: JOURNALS/a/tdtdGold nanoparticles are under consideration for a number of biomedical applications, such as tumor treatment. A German-American research team at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Hunter College in New York, and the RWTH Aachen has now developed a new method for the production of nanoscopic gold rods./td/tr/tbody/table In contrast to previous methods, they have achieved this without the use of cytotoxic additives. As they report in the journal Angewandte Chemie, the synthesis is not carried out in water, but in an ionic liquid, a "liquid salt".br /br /Cancer cells are relatively temperature-sensitive. This is exploited in treatments involving overheating of parts of the cancer patient's body. One highly promising method is photoinduced hyperthermia, in which light energy is converted to heat. Gold nanoparticles absorb light very strongly in the near infrared, a spectral region that is barely absorbed by tissue. The absorbed light energy causes the gold particles to vibrate and is dissipated into the surrounding area as heat. The tiny gold particles can be functionalized so that the specifically bind to tumor cells. Thus, only cells that contain gold particles are killed off.br /br /The problem? Ordinary spherical gold particles do not efficiently convert the light energy into heat; only rod-shaped particles will do. Unfortunately, the additives needed to crystallize the rod-shaped particles from aqueous solutions are cytotoxic.br /br /The team headed by Michael R. Bockstaller is now pursuing a new strategy: instead of aqueous solution, they chose to use an ionic liquid as their medium of crystallization. Ionic liquids are "liquid salts", organic compounds that exist as oppositely charged ions, but in the liquid state. In this way, the researchers have been able to produce gold nanorods without the use of any cytotoxic additives.br /br /In the first step, seed crystals are produced in the form of tiny spherical gold particles. These crystals are added to a "secondary growth solution" containing monovalent gold ions, silver ions, and the weak reducing agent ascorbic acid. The solvent is an imidazolium-based ionic liquid. In this medium, the crystals don't continue to grow into spheres; instead they form rods with the round crystallization nuclei as "heads". The mechanism is presumed to involve the various, energetically inequivalent surfaces of the crystal lattice: the aromatic, nitrogen-containing five-membered rings of the ionic liquid prefer to accumulate at the highly energetic facets of gold surfaces. They thus stabilize crystal shapes that have fewer low-energy facets than the normal spherical equilibrium form. This results in long rods. ###br /br /Author: Michael R. Bockstaller, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh (USA), a href="http://neon.mems.cmu.edu/people/bockstaller.html" target="ext"emProfessor Michael R. Bockstaller/em/a Title: Imidazolium-Based Ionic Liquids as Efficient Shape-Regulating Solvents for the Synthesis of Gold Nanorods Angewandte Chemie International Edition 2008, 47, No. 40, doi: 10.1002/anie.200802185br /br /Contact: Michael R. Bockstaller a href="mailto:bockstaller@cmu.edu"bockstaller@cmu.edu/a 412-268-2709 a href="http://www.wiley.com/wiley-blackwell" target="ext"Wiley-Blackwell/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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A new 'Pyrex' nanoparticle

Adam Nucci — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 13:22:00 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Borosilicate glass nanoparticles" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPOr8J2gxJI/AAAAAAAAIRM/CD-whA3Zu2A/s1600-h/nano_glass_nanoparticles.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPOr8J2gxJI/AAAAAAAAIRM/CD-whA3Zu2A/s320/nano_glass_nanoparticles.jpg" alt="Borosilicate glass nanoparticles" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5256734239996560530" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: Borosilicate glass nanoparticles. Credit: Martin Gijs, EPFL Usage Restrictions: Copyright Nature Nanotechnology./tdtdResearchers in Switzerland have developed a new method to fabricate borosilicate glass nanoparticles. Used in microfluidic systems, these "Pyrex"-like nanoparticles are more stable when subjected to temperature fluctuations and harsh chemical environments than currently used nanoparticles made of polymers or silica glass./td/tr/tbody/table Their introduction could extend the range of potential nanoparticle applications in biomedical, optical and electronic fields.br /br /Thanks to their large surface-to-volume ratio, nanoparticles have generated wide interest as potential transporters of antibodies, drugs, or chemicals for use in diagnostic tests, targeted drug therapy, or for catalyzing chemical reactions. Unfortunately, these applications are limited because nanoparticles disintegrate or bunch together when exposed to elevated temperatures, certain chemicals, or even de-ionized water. Using borosilicate glass (the original "Pyrex") instead of silica glass or polymers would overcome these limitations, but fabrication has been impossible to date due to the instability of the boron oxide precursor materials.br /br /In this week's advance online issue of Nature Nanotechnology, a group of EPFL researchers, led by Professor Martin Gijs, reports on a new procedure to fabricate and characterize borosilicate glass nanoparticles. In addition to biomedical applications, the new nanoparticles could also have applications in the production of photonic bandgap devices with high optical contrast, contrast agents for ultrasonic microscopy or chemical filtration membranes. ###br /br /Contact: Professor Martin Gijs, tel: +41 21 693 6734 a href="mailto:martin.gijs@epfl.ch"martin.gijs@epfl.ch/a Microsystems technology laboratory, EPFL a href="http://lmis2.epfl.ch/" target="ext"lmis2.epfl.ch//abr /br /Contact: Mary Parlange a href="mailto:mary.parlange@epfl.ch"mary.parlange@epfl.ch/a 41-216-937-022 a href="http://www.epfl.ch/" target="ext"Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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NIST and partners identify tiny gold clusters as top-notch catalysts

Adam Nucci — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 16:23:35 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Electron Micrographs of Gold Nanocluster Catalysts" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPKDbBfkBEI/AAAAAAAAIQ0/WDV7B5Swojk/s1600-h/nano_gold_nanocluster.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPKDbBfkBEI/AAAAAAAAIQ0/WDV7B5Swojk/s320/nano_gold_nanocluster.jpg" alt="Electron Micrographs of Gold Nanocluster Catalysts" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5256408215375316034" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: Electron micrographs showing inactive (left) and active (right) catalysts consisting of gold particles absorbed on iron oxide. The red circles indicate the presence of individual gold atoms. The yellow circles show the location of subnanometer gold clusters that can effectively catalyze the conversion of carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide. One nanometer is about half the size of a DNA molecule. (Color added for clarity)br /br /Credit: Lehigh University Center for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology. Usage Restrictions: None./tdtdFor most of us, gold is only valuable if we possess it in large-sized pieces. However, the "bigger is better" rule isn't the case for those interested in exploiting gold's exceptional ability to catalyze a wide variety of chemical reactions, including the oxidation of poisonous carbon monoxide (CO) into harmless carbon dioxide at room temperatures. That process, if industrialized, could potentially improve the effectiveness of catalytic converters that clean automobile exhaust and breathing devices that protect miners and firefighters./td/tr/tbody/table For this purpose, nanoclusters—gold atoms bound together in crystals smaller than a strand of DNA—are the size most treasured.br /br /Using a pair of scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) instruments for which spherical aberration (a system fault yielding blurry images) is corrected, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Lehigh University (Bethlehem, Pa.) and Cardiff University (Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom) for the first time achieved state-of-the-art resolution of the active gold nanocrystals absorbed onto iron oxide surfaces. In fact, the resolution was sensitive enough to even visualize individual gold atoms.br /br /The work is reported in the Sept. 5, 2008, issue of Science.br /br /Surface science studies have suggested that there is a critical size range at which gold nanocrystals supported by iron oxide become highly active as catalysts for CO oxidation. However, the theory is based on research using idealized catalyst models made of gold absorbed on titanium oxide. The NIST/Lehigh/Cardiff aberration-corrected STEM imaging technique allows the researchers to study the real iron oxide catalyst systems as synthesized, identify all of the gold structures present in each sample, and then characterize which cluster sizes are most active in CO conversion.br /br /The research team discovered that size matters a lot—samples ranged from those with little or no catalytic activity (less than 1 percent CO conversion) to others with nearly 100 percent efficiency. Their results revealed that the most active gold nanoclusters for CO conversion are bilayers approximately 0.5-0.8 nanometer in diameter (40 times smaller than the common cold virus) and containing about 10 gold atoms. This finding is consistent with the previous surface science studies done on the gold-titanium oxide models. ###br /br /A.A. Herzing, C.J. Kiely, A.F. Carley, P. Landon and G.J. Hutchings. Identification of active gold nanoclusters on iron oxide supports for CO oxidation. Science, Vol. 321, Issue 5894, Sept. 5, 2008.br /br /Contact: Michael E. Newman a href="mailto:michael.newman@nist.gov"michael.newman@nist.gov/a 301-975-3025 a href="http://www.nist.gov/" target="ext"National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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Parallel “nano-soldering” technique chosen for year’s top-50 by Nanotech Briefs

Adam Nucci — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 11:53:09 -0700

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tabletbodytrtda title="Center for Integrated Technologies (CINT)" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPD0ZeKHPjI/AAAAAAAAIQk/Dw7bziTudi0/s1600-h/nano_cint.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SPD0ZeKHPjI/AAAAAAAAIQk/Dw7bziTudi0/s320/nano_cint.jpg" alt="Center for Integrated Technologies (CINT)" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5255969483570757170" border="0" //a/tdtdYou should have so much patience to solder nanowires to nanoelectrodes. Talk about fine work. (A nanometer is a billionth of a meter.)br /br /That's why a new electroplating process that simultaneously joins many silicon nanowires to many prepatterned electrodes was selected for a 2008 Nano 50 Award by Nanotech Briefs./td/tr/tbody/tableThe process removes many difficulties.br /br /"All of the electroplating is done in parallel," says Sean Hearne, a Sandia National Laboratories researcher at the Center for Integrated Technologies (CINT). "Everywhere there's a metal contact, the electroplated nickel grows over the nanowire, capturing it."br /br /CINT is a DOE Office of Science nanotechnology center led by Sandia and Los Alamos National Laboratory.br /br /Previous methods connected electrodes to nanowires one contact at a time. That kind of service may sound great in stockbroker ads; in a lab, it's merely tedious.br /br /Other methods required complex processes that included masking, metal deposition, and stripping, which often damaged the nano-wires.br /br /The process could be important for commercial applications of semiconducting nanowires used in electronic sensor arrays, because it allows for the parallel processing of millions of nano-wires on a single wafer at lower cost than previous lithographic techniques.br /br /In the team's approach, microarrays of composite gold electrodes were lithographically formed on oxidized silicon substrates, followed by electric-field-assisted alignment of silicon nanowires between the electrodes.br /br /The nanowire ends were then embedded in nickel by selective electrodeposition over the prepatterned electrodes. Annealing to 300 °C provided good electrical contacts for the doped nanowires.br /br /The approach provides a parallel, maskless method to establish metal contacts to nanowires without need of high-resolution electron beam lithography for electrical and mechanical applications.br /br /Hearne, who developed the electroplating process, worked with Arizona State University research leads and Tom Picraux, CINT chief scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The overall work was led by former ASU School of Materials student Sarang Ingole, an advisee of Picraux. It was part of an ASU User Proposal with CINT titled "Doped SiGe Nanowires for Functional Nanodevices." The subject was proposed by principal investigator Steve Goodnick and co-principal investigator Clarence Tracy, both at ASU.br /br /The work, titled "Directed Assembly of Nanowire-Metal Contacts," was chiefly conducted at CINT's Los Alamos and Albuquerque sites. It appeared in a July 2007 issue of Applied Physics Letters as both a Letter and a cover image. ###br /br /The Nano 50 will be presented at a special awards dinner to be held during the NASA Tech Briefs National Nano Engineering Conference in Boston on Nov. 12-13.br /br /Winners are judged by a team of nanotechnology experts. They select the top 50 technologies, products, and innovators that have significantly impacted — or are expected to impact — the state of the art in nanotechnology.br /br /The 2008 Awards are posted at: a href="http://www.nanotechbriefs.com/nano50/nano50.winners.08.html" target="ext"nanotechbriefs.com/nano50/nano50.winners/a.br /br /The Sandia/Los Alamos facility is one of the five DOE Nanoscale Science Research Centers (NSRCs) — premier national user facilities for interdisciplinary research at the nanoscale. Together the NSRCs comprise a suite of complementary facilities that provide researchers with state-of-the-art capabilities to fabricate, process, characterize, and model nanoscale materials.br /br /The Centers constitute the largest infrastructure investment of the National Nanotechnology Initiative. Other centers are located at DOE's Argonne, Brookhaven, Lawrence Berkeley, and Oak Ridge national laboratories. For more information about the DOE NSRCs, please visit a href="http://nano.energy.gov/" target="ext"http://nano.energy.gov/a.br /br /Sandia is a multiprogram laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a Lockheed Martin company, for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration. With main facilities in Albuquerque, N.M., and Livermore, Calif., Sandia has major Ramp;D responsibilities in national security, energy and environmental technologies, and economic competitiveness.br /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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NIST studies how new helium ion microscope measures up

Adam Nucci — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 13:12:00 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="320"a title="Helium Ion Microscope" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO-1L3R_kRI/AAAAAAAAIQM/u-Ocd08zNi0/s1600-h/nano_microscope.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO-1L3R_kRI/AAAAAAAAIQM/u-Ocd08zNi0/s320/nano_microscope.jpg" alt="Helium Ion Microscope " id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5255618505587265810" border="0" //abr /br /Caption: In-depth look: An image of gold atoms on tin from a state-of-the-art scanning electron microscope (left) has relatively poor depth of field-only parts of the image are in sharp focus. By contrast, the entire image from a helium ion microscope image (right) is sharp and clear. NIST researchers are studying helium ion microscopes to improve measurements at the nanoscale that are important to the semiconductor and nanomanufacturing industries.br /br /Credit: NIST. Usage Restrictions: None./tdtdJust as test pilots push planes to explore their limits, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) are probing the newest microscope technology to further improve measurement accuracy at the nanoscale. Better nanoscale measurements are critical for setting standards and improving production in the semiconductor and nanomanufacturing industries.br /br /This new microscope technology uses helium ions to generate the signal used to image extremely small objects, a technique analogous to the scanning electron microscope, which was first introduced commercially in the 1960s./td/tr/tbody/table Paradoxically, although helium ions are far larger than electrons, they can provide higher resolution images with higher contrast. The depth of field is much better with the new technology too, so more of the image is in focus. “It is the physics,” explains Andras Vladar, SEM project leader in NIST’s Nanoscale-Metrology Group. “Ions have larger mass and shorter wavelength than electrons, so they can be better for imaging.” The images, he says, appear almost three-dimensional, revealing details smaller than a nanometer—the distance spanned by only three atoms in the silicon crystal.br /br /NIST is working to understand the imaging mechanisms of this new technology. The clearest advantage of the helium ion microscope is that the images show the actual edge of a sample better than the SEM, which is critical in precision manufacturing. “Meeting critical dimensions by knowing where an edge is in high-tech manufacturing can mean the difference of hundreds of dollars per piece,” explains Michael Postek, chief of the NIST Precision Engineering Division and the nanomanufacturing program manager. Semiconductor manufacturers have multi-million dollar scanning electron microscopes all along their production lines to help control their microchip manufacturing processes.br /br /NIST received the first-ever commercial helium ion microscope, called Orion, from Carl Zeiss, Inc., last summer as part of a cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA). Researchers are test-piloting it in NIST’s Advanced Measurement Laboratory (AML), one of the most environmentally stable research facilities in the world. Carefully controlled for vibration, humidity and temperature changes, AML labs are optimal sites to test new microscope technology, say the researchers. “What we are learning,” explains Postek, “goes directly back to the manufacturers to improve their products, which allows NIST and industry to obtain the most precise measurements possible. We are transferring NIST technology and sharing our research with the semiconductor industry trade organization, SEMATECH.”br /br /One such NIST contribution is “fast imaging,” a technique Vladar developed to obtain sharper images. A combination of vibrations at the nanoscale and taking images at high resolutions left certain images fuzzy, similar to what happens when taking a picture of a moving baby with a slow shutter speed. Instead of collecting the signal slowly and getting a fuzzy image, the NIST technique collects many images as fast as possible and merges them using a clever algorithm to reduce the fuzziness and result in a much sharper image.br /br /Zeiss has recently replaced the original Orion with the first-ever Orion Plus, which incorporates many of NIST’s suggestions in its design, including an improved cooling system for the helium source for improved imaging ###br /br /Contact: Evelyn Brown a href="mailto:evelyn.brown@nist.gov"evelyn.brown@nist.gov/a 301-975-5661 a href="http://www.nist.gov/" target="ext"National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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Bottoms up: Better organic semiconductors for printable electronics

Adam Nucci — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 16:51:24 -0700

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tabletbodytrtd width="298"a title="Organic Semiconductors for Printable Electronics" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO6XVVELqxI/AAAAAAAAIPs/tvZ690ijKVs/s1600-h/nano_organic_semiconductor.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO6XVVELqxI/AAAAAAAAIPs/tvZ690ijKVs/s320/nano_organic_semiconductor.jpg" alt="Organic Semiconductors for Printable Electronics" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5255304207875681042" border="0" //abr /br /Bottoms Up: Better Organic Semiconductors for Printable Electronicsbr /br /Caption: Restacking organic semiconductors: An improved formulation for a polymer blend semiconductor causes key semiconducting molecules to migrate to the bottom of the active layer, allowing chip designers to replace top-gated structures (a) with more easily manufactured bottom-gate, bottom-contact devices (b).br /br /Credit: Credit: Yoon, SNU/Talbott, NIST. Usage Restrictions: None./tdtdResearchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and Seoul National University (SNU) have learned how to tweak a new class of polymer-based semiconductors to better control the location and alignment of the components of the blend. Their recent results—how to move the top to the bottom—could enable the design of practical, large-scale manufacturing techniques for a wide range of printable, flexible electronic displays and other devices.*br /br /Organic semiconductors—novel carbon-based molecules that have similar electrical properties to more conventional semiconducting materials like silicon and germanium—are a hot research topic because practical, high-performance organic semiconductors would open up whole new categories of futuristic electronic devices. Think of tabloid-sized “digital paper” that you could fold up into your pocket or huge sheets of photovoltaic cells that are dirt cheap because they’re manufactured by—basically—ink-jet printing./td/tr/tbody/tableThe problem is performance. Small organic molecules have been developed with key electrical parameters close to the benchmark set by amorphous silicon semiconductors, but they are very difficult to deposit in a stable, uniform film—a key manufacturing requirement. Larger molecule polymer semiconductors, on the other hand, make excellent thin films but have at best limited semiconductor properties. A patent from British researchers in 2005 offered a promising compromise: blend the small semiconductor molecules in with the polymer. This works surprisingly well, but with an asterisk. Tests showed that actual devices, field effect transistors, made with the blend only worked well in a so-called “top-gated” structure. The critical active part of the film was on the top, and the switching part of the device (the “gate”) had to be layered on top of that, a process difficult or impossible to do on a large scale without destroying the fragile film.br /br /Working at NIST’s Center for Neutron Research, the SNU/NIST research team used a neutron imaging technique that allowed them to observe, with nanometer resolution, how the distribution of small organic semiconductor molecules embedded in polymer films changed with depth—the films are less than 100 nanometers thick. In the thin films originally described by the patent, the bulk of the semiconductor molecules end up at the top of the film, as suspected. However, when the SNU/NIST research team substituted a polymer with significantly higher molecular mass, something interesting happened. The organic semiconductor small molecules distributed themselves evenly at the top and bottom of the film. Having an active region of the film on the bottom is key for large-scale manufacturing because it means the rest of the device—gate, source, drain—can be laid down first and the delicate film layer added last.br /br /In addition, they report, the optimized blend of polymer and organic semiconductor actually has better performance characteristics than the organic semiconductor on its own. ###br /br /* J. Kang, N. Shin, D.Y. Jang, V.M. Prabhu and D.Y. Yoon. Structure and properties of small molecule-polymer blend semiconductors for organic thin film transistors. Journal of the American Chemical Society, Published on the Web Aug. 23, 2008.br /br /Contact: Michael Baum a href="mailto:michael.baum@nist.gov"michael.baum@nist.gov/a 301-975-2763 a href="http://www.nist.gov/" target="ext"National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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NSF-funded Rice study will trace path of nanomaterials

Adam Nucci — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 12:43:42 -0700

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NSF-funded Rice study will trace path of nanomaterials Researchers want to know if particles can be transported through food chainbr /br /Working to ensure the safe use of nanomaterials is the basis of a new Rice study funded by the National Science Foundation.tabletbodytrtd width="250" align="center"a title="Pedro Alvarez" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO0KXlFI2LI/AAAAAAAAIO8/wM1i7BNstlk/s1600-h/pedro_alvarez_2.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO0KXlFI2LI/AAAAAAAAIO8/wM1i7BNstlk/s320/pedro_alvarez_2.jpg" alt="Pedro Alvarez" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5254867740418169010" border="0" //abr /br /Pedro Alvarez/tdtdLed by Pedro Alvarez, the George R. Brown Professor and chair of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, and Vicki Colvin, a professor of chemistry and director of the Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology, the study will trace tagged nanoparticles to increase understanding of how they move through the environment and what impact they may have on the health and function of natural systems./td/tr/tbody/tableWith industrial-scale production of materials that use nanoparticles on the near horizon, Alvarez said now is the time to address concerns over their safety.tabletbodytrtd“Nanotechnology offers tremendous potential to enhance our quality of life, from improving the performance of commercial products, to enhanced diagnosis and treatment of disease, to refining water and cleaning up the environment,” said Alvarez a day after returning from Mexico, where he and others from his department met with officials to discuss a water-purification project based on Rice technology./tdtd width="250" align="center"a title="Vicki Colvin" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO0MUOEG6RI/AAAAAAAAIPE/q90OfqgYY0w/s1600-h/vicki_colvin_2.jpg" target="ext"img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_TZ4zYEBSw1I/SO0MUOEG6RI/AAAAAAAAIPE/q90OfqgYY0w/s320/vicki_colvin_2.jpg" alt="Vicki Colvin" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5254869881723480338" border="0" //abr /br /Vicki Colvin/td/tr/tbody/tableNanotechnology, he said, “is full of initially promising qualities, but you have to consider the potential for environmental damage. For example, look at DDT. Hans Mueller won the Nobel Prize in 1948 for using DDT to fight malaria, but now we know the environmental damage impact.”br /br /He said the study will take a proactive approach to the potential dangers of nanoparticles, a subject that has found its way into the popular press in recent years.br /br /“When you have an increase in the production of nanomaterials, I can assure you some will enter the environment through waste or the manufacturing process,” said Alvarez. “We’re focusing on fullerenes, and this grant is aimed at trying to understand their impact.br /br /“One aspect is to look at what nanomaterials do to, or in, the environment,” he said. But Alvarez and Colvin are turning the tables to see what the environment does to nanomaterials. “When you alter the structure of fullerenes, via bacterial means or fungi or enzymes, you may also affect their toxicity or reactivity.”br /br /John Fortner, a Rice research scientist whose thesis was on fullerene behavior in water, said fullerenes made with 14C, a mildly radioactive carbon isotope, were manufactured for the study. The tagged fullerenes can be tracked easily as they’re altered by microbes, specifically fungi, and even monitored if they are completely broken down into carbon dioxide molecules.br /br /“Fungi are amazing in their tolerance and what they can degrade,” said Fortner. “It is amazing what fungi can break down biochemically, from pollutants to wood, even things like tires and nylon.”br /br /It’s how fungi change the structure of the fullerene molecules, if at all, that’s of interest and how that material is released back into the environment. “In what form will they reach an organism, and will that form be detrimental? That’s a tough question to answer,” he said.br /br /The good news, said Alvarez, is that “we’ll be able to know for sure where they end up. We also plan to study whether this nanomaterial bioaccumulates and whether it can be transported through the food chain.br /br /“There are many critical gaps in determining how dangerous nanomaterial is,” he said. “So our strategy is to inform safety by design, safe disposal and safe manufacturing and handling.” ###br /br /Contact: Mike Williams a href="mailto:mikewilliams@rice.edu"mikewilliams@rice.edu/a 713-348-6728 a href="http://media.rice.edu/" target="ext"Rice University/abr /br /Tags: a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nano" target="ext" rel="tag"Nano/a or a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotechnology" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotechnology/a and a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Nanotech" target="ext" rel="tag"Nanotech/a
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