Inverted Colloidal Crystal Membranes

摘要克莱姆森大学和科罗拉多州立大学的一个研究小组将通过合成、表征、分子建模和实验验证来开发用于蛋白质分离的倒置胶体晶体（ICC）膜。目的是利用ICC材料高度均匀可控的孔径、完全连通的孔和大空隙体积的优势进行高速、高效的色谱生物分离。虽然在合成过程中ICC膜的结构特性将被控制，但pi将使用合成后的表面修饰工具来定制ICC膜的化学性质。分子建模将在设计过程中发挥关键作用，为研究表面修饰对膜电荷状态的影响提供工具，并在虚拟环境中确定最佳的操作pH条件。制造具有精确控制孔径和窄孔径分布的高多孔膜材料仍然是一个主要挑战。另一个挑战是通过建模了解这种膜的物理化学性质如何影响其进行生物分离的性能。需要克服的挑战包括：设计、合成和表征高度有序、功能化的ICC膜。利用ICC膜表征蛋白质的突破反应和分离因子。模拟和可视化ICC膜特性和蛋白质突破。由于ICC膜具有均匀可控的孔径和完全相互连接的周期性孔结构，因此在膜色谱中具有广泛的应用前景。ICC膜也代表了用于生物分离和生物医学分离的新一代微滤和超滤膜。更广泛的影响。该项目将包括一个本科生团队，作为本科生创意探究（UCI）项目的一部分。UCI计划的目标是教育学生科学研究的方法，促进推理，道德判断和有效的沟通技巧。UCI的研究人员将参与台式和建模项目，并将接受计算机建模、膜合成和蛋白质分离基础知识的培训。推广活动的目标是通过现有的针对中学生和中学数学和科学教育者的课程，将实验和模拟作为教学工具。通过“聚合物之爪”外展项目，我们将向12名西班牙裔中学生教授工程和科学概念，他们每月来学校1-2次。为期一周的夏令营项目将作为暑期科学、工程和建筑系列课程的一部分。选定的夏令营活动将以类似的形式进行，例如为即将升入八年级的女生提供为期一周的住宿夏令营Project WISE，以及为计划主修工程、数学或科学的大一新生提供为期一周的Sneak-A-Peek。该研究对蛋白质组学研究具有潜在的启示意义。为了鉴定蛋白质及其功能，将蛋白质组分解成其组成部分是一项必须克服的重大研究挑战，其最终目标是诊断和治疗疾病。由于其高度均匀的三维结构，所开发的ICC膜将比目前使用的色谱方法具有更高的生产率，从而实现高效的蛋白质分离。

AbstractPROPOSAL NUMBER: CBET-0651231PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: SCOTT HUSSONAFFILIATION: CLEMSON UNIVERSITYPROPOSAL TITLE: INVERTED COLLOIDAL CRYSTAL MEMBRANESA team of Clemson University and Colorado State University faculty will develop inverted colloidal crystal (ICC) membranes for protein separations through the synthesis and haracterization, molecular modeling, and experimental validation. An aim is to take advantage of the highly uniform and controllable pore size, fully interconnected pores, and large void volume of ICC materials for high speed, high efficiency chromatographic bioseparations. While the structural properties of the ICC membranes will be controlled during synthesis, the PIs will use post-synthesis surface modification tools to tailor the chemistry of the ICC membranes. Molecular modeling will play a critical role in the design process, providing a tool for studying the influence of the surface modifications onmembrane charge state, and identifying optimized operating pH conditions in a virtual environment.Intellectual Merit It remains a major challenge to create highly porous membrane materials that have precisely controlled pore sizes and narrow pore-size distributions. Another challenge is to understand through modeling how the physicochemical properties of such a membrane would affect its performance to carry out biological separations. Challenges to overcome include: . Designing, synthesizing, and characterizing highly ordered, functionalized ICC membranes. Characterizing the breakthrough response and separation factors for proteins using ICC membranes. Modeling and visualizing ICC membrane properties and protein breakthrough.Since ICC membranes have uniform and controllable pore size and a fully interconnected, periodic pore structure, they will find numerous applications in membrane chromatography. ICC membranes could also represent a new generation of microfiltration and ultrafiltration membranes for bioseparations and biomedical separations.Broader Impacts. The program will involve a team of undergraduates as part ofthe Undergraduate Creative Inquiry (UCI) Program. The UCI program goals are to educate the students in the methods of scientific research and to promote reasoning, ethical judgment, and effective communication skills. UCI researchers will participate in both bench-top and modeling projects and will be trained in the fundamentals of computer modeling, membrane synthesis, and protein separation. The goal of the outreach activities is to incorporate experimentation and simulation as teaching tools through existing programs targeted at middle school students and middle school math and science educators. Through the Paws for Polymers outreach program, we will teach engineering and science concepts to twelve Hispanic middle school students who come to campus 1-2 times per month. A week-long summer camp program for these students will be conducted as part of the Summer Science, Engineering and Architecture series. Selected camp activities will be used in a similar format for Project WISE, a 1-week residential camp for rising 8th grade girls, and Sneak-A-Peek, a 1-week camp for incoming female freshmen who plan on majoring in engineering, math, or science. The proposed research has potential implications for proteomics research. Fractionating the proteome into its constituents is a major research challenge that must be met in order to identify proteins and their functions, with the ultimate goal of diagnosing and treating diseases. The ICC membranes that are developed will lead to highly efficient protein separations with higher productivity than currently used chromatographic methods, as a result of their highly uniform three-dimensional structures.