EAGER: Plasma-Soft Matter interactions: Towards understanding the effect of nonequilibrium, cold plasma on liquid phase chemical reactions in cells using novel chemical sensors

1249787Foster等离子体医学是医疗保健的一个新兴子领域，其中电离气体（等离子体）用于治疗和治疗疾病的目的。因为电离气体或等离子体是在正常大气压和室温下产生的，所以它可以很容易地应用于受伤或患病的人体组织。 血浆医学的范围包括1）医疗器械或人体组织的灭菌？直接针对“超级细菌”例如食肉细菌 2) 伤口愈合 3) 牙科护理（从牙齿清洁到根管治疗） 4) 局部皮肤治疗 5) 抗真菌疗法 6) 治疗克罗恩氏综合症等慢性疾病 7) 凝血管理 8) 整容手术，甚至 9) 癌症治疗。显然，血浆医学在整个医学领域具有巨大的潜力和新的前景。虽然等离子体在医学领域用于治疗和灭菌的转化潜力已得到充分证明，但尚未对等离子体辐射对活体组织的影响进行系统研究。缺少真正阐明治愈机制的系统研究。此外，可以说缺乏直接观察和测量细胞（软物质）内等离子体引起的变化所需的足够工具。 本研究旨在通过识别等离子体处理的生物组织中入射和返回的等离子体种类，以及表征细胞本身内等离子体驱动的反应，来区分等离子体暴露对细胞化学的原因和影响。 这种等离子体与软物质的相互作用至关重要。在这项研究中，将使用独立的、化学敏感的纳米探针注入所研究的细胞中来研究和量化等离子体暴露引起的细胞内化学变化。分散在细胞内的注射纳米探针发出的荧光信号的变化反映了内部细胞条件（例如 pH 水平、氧气或自由基浓度）的特定变化。本研究中使用的电离气源是“冷”气源。等离子射流。 射流高度准直和高度定向，使得应用于细胞基底相对简单。内部细胞变化将与血浆条件相关，而血浆条件又将使用微波和光学诊断来表征。所提出的方法是新颖且具有开创性的，因为它为实时分析等离子体对细胞化学的影响铺平了道路，从而有助于了解等离子体的治疗特性。这项研究工作的回报很高，因为它有可能为直接评估细胞内等离子体诱导的条件作为等离子体暴露时间的函数奠定基础，从而真正量化并最终了解等离子体暴露对细胞的影响。拟议工作的更广泛影响是广泛的，因为它研究了一种新方法来评估当活细胞暴露于血浆时在细胞间水平诱导的效应。这项研究获得的数据有望为了解血浆药物的治疗效果提供基础。从这项工作中获得的理解也将有助于定制等离子体治疗设备，因为等离子体发生器设置和在细胞水平诱导的效应之间的关系将得到很好的量化。迄今为止，血浆医学的发展有些“爱迪生式”。在方法中。虽然在任何新兴领域，这种方法都可以在早期发挥作用，但为了从人类治疗的角度了解所涉及的机制，需要诊断来指导发展并为预测理论提供基础。这项工作预计将通过提供直接、近乎实时的诊断来测量细胞本身内等离子体引起的效应，从而促进令人兴奋的等离子体医学新领域的发展和潜在主流化。这项工作对医疗保健领域做出了贡献，因为它已被证明血浆药物可以明显促进伤口愈合。门诊伤口治疗是一个全球价值数十亿美元的领域（仅在美国每年就达到 200 亿美元），为那些患有慢性伤口（例如糖尿病患者）的患者提供治疗——仅在美国就有近 600 万人。

1249787FosterPlasma medicine is a new and emerging subfield of healthcare in which ionized gas (plasma) is used for the purpose of therapy and the treatment of disease. Because the ionized gas or plasma is produced at normal atmospheric pressure and room temperature, it can readily be applied to injured or diseased human tissue. The scope of plasma medicine includes 1) sterilization of medical instruments or human tissue?directly addressing ?super bugs? such as flesh eating bacteria 2) wound healing 3) dental care?from tooth cleaning to root canals 4) topical skin treatment 5) anti-fungal therapies 6) treatment of chronic disease such as Crohn?s syndrome 7) management of blood coagulation 8) cosmetic surgery, and even 9) the treatment of cancer. It is clear that plasma medicine holds great potential and new vistas for the field of medicine in general. While the transformational potential of plasmas for therapy and sterilization in the medical field is well documented, a systematic investigation into the effects of plasma irradiation on living tissue has yet to be carried out. Missing is a systematic study that truly elucidates the healing mechanisms. Further it can be argued that lacking are adequate tools necessary to observe and measure the plasma-induced changes within cells (soft matter) directly. This research aims to differentiate between the cause and the effect of plasma exposure on cell chemistry by identifying the plasma species that are incident on and returning from biological tissues treated by plasmas, and characterizing the plasma-driven reactions within the cell itself. It is this plasma-soft matter interaction that is of paramount importance. In this investigation, free-standing, chemistry-sensitive nano-probes injected into the cells under study will be used to investigate and quantify intracellular chemical changes brought on by plasma exposure. Changes in fluorescence signal from the injected nano-probes dispersed within the cell reflect specific changes in internal cell conditions such as pH level, oxygen, or radical concentration. The ionized gas source to be used in this research is a ?cold? plasma jet. The jet is highly collimated and highly directional, making application to the cell substrate relatively straightforward. Internal cell changes will be correlated with plasma conditions, which in turn will be characterized using microwave and optical diagnostics. The proposed methodology is novel and groundbreaking in that it paves the way for real time analysis of the effect of plasma on cell chemistry thereby leading to an understanding of the curative properties of plasmas. This research effort is high payoff in that it has the potential to lay the foundation for a direct assessment of plasma-induced conditions within the cell as a function of plasma exposure time, thereby truly quantifying and ultimately understanding the effect of plasma exposure on the cell. The broader impact of the proposed work is broad in that it investigates a novel approach to assessing effects induced at the intercellular level when living cells are exposed to plasma. The data obtained in this study is expected to provide a basis for understanding the therapeutic effects associated with plasma medicine. The understanding gained from this effort will also be useful in tailoring plasma therapy equipment as the relationship between the plasma generator settings and effects induced at the cellular level will be well quantified. To date, plasma medicine development has been somewhat ?Edisonian? in approach. While in any new and emerging field, this approach can be effective early on, to obtain an understanding of mechanisms involved from a human therapy standpoint, diagnostics are needed to guide the development and provide the foundations for predictive theory. The effort is expected to contribute to the growth and potential mainstreaming of the exciting new field of plasma medicine by providing a direct, near real-time diagnostics for measuring plasma-induced effects within the cell itself. This work contributes to the field of healthcare as it has been demonstrated that plasma medicine among other things clearly enhances wound healing. Outpatient wound treatment is a many-billion dollar field worldwide (20 billion dollars annually in the U.S. alone) addressing those who suffer from chronic wounds (diabetics for example)?nearly 6 million in the US alone.