CAREER: Characterizing Nanoparticle Surface Interactions using Dissolution Dynamic Nuclear Polarization-Enhanced Nuclear Magnetic Resonance

Clemson University, Clemson SC

Investigators

Abstract

This CAREER award, supported by the Chemical Measurement and Imaging Program in the Division of Chemistry with co-funding from the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR), enables Professor Leah Casabianca and her group at Clemson University to develop new methods (based on Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy) for determination of the structure of biologically-relevant molecules interacting with the surface of nanoparticles. NMR is a powerful technique for determining the structure of molecules, including bond angles and distances not available through any other technique. Dr. Casabianca's work is important for understanding how nanoparticles behave when they enter the body, which is increasingly relevant as the use of nanoparticles in medicine and consumer products increases. The Casabianca group is using a combination of experimental solution-state NMR techniques, computer modeling, and innovative methods to improve the sensitivity of NMR and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) to determine the structure of peptides and proteins interacting with nanoparticle surfaces. The integrated educational aims of this work seek to increase the number of female and minority students in South Carolina who are excited about using computer science to solve problems in chemistry. This is being addressed by developing an undergraduate computational chemistry course, introducing computer programming into the junior-level quantum mechanics course, and creating fun and exciting lessons incorporating MRI and computer science for summer camps for middle-school girls. NMR is not ideally suited for surface studies due to its low sensitivity. To address this issue, the Casabianca lab is using Dynamic Nuclear Polarization (DNP) to enhance the NMR signal of nuclei near the nanoparticle surface. They are calibrating the distance dependence of polarization transfer from a nanoparticle surface to nearby nuclei and creating DNP-enhanced nanoparticle tracers for MRI. Broader impacts of this research will derive from the development of NMR methods for understanding interactions at the nanoparticle surface, which can be applied to nanoparticles used in applications such as drug delivery, catalysis, contrast agents, and biosensors. Broader impacts of the educational plan include increasing the number of female and minority students in South Carolina who are interested in computational chemistry. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.