CAREER: Photothermal Recycling Nanosensor for Continuous Biomolecular Monitoring

持续监测人体内的生物和化学标志物代表了医学技术的重大进步，为个人的健康状况提供了全面的见解。这种监测能力的发展对于医疗专业人员管理免疫系统受损患者至关重要——免疫系统受损是美国医院每年造成大量死亡的原因，也是诊断和管理成本最高的疾病之一。快速、频繁地获取患者免疫状态的能力对寻求做出明智临床决策的医生构成了挑战，最近的COVID-19大流行凸显了这一现实。该研究项目旨在开发一种新的生物监测技术，使临床医生能够在护理点直接评估患者的免疫功能。这将通过将纳米材料和生物分子整合到一种新型诊断设备中来实现。除了医学应用之外，这种生物传感技术在环境监测、水质评估和药品生产监督方面也有潜在的用途。此外，本项目将探索应用生物监测技术来研究不同教育背景的学生在学习过程中的情绪反应。在教育研究方面，该项目将为学生提供新的学习资源，拓宽研究机会，并为STEM教育管道中的高中生和大学生提供量身定制的研究培训计划。了解人类免疫学的规则需要持续获得免疫系统状态，这可以提供关于健康和疾病中免疫功能的动态见解。我们对驱动免疫功能障碍的潜在机制的了解存在重大差距，而且我们缺乏能够持续监测免疫反应的工具。目前迫切需要新的生物传感技术，以实现持续的免疫监测、及时的疾病轨迹预测和量身定制的医疗干预。该项目的总体目标是开发一种新的光热循环（PTR）生物传感技术，以满足频繁的在线免疫调节剂监测的生物分析需求。生物化学监测的主要技术挑战是在保持高灵敏度和特异性的同时实现快速传感器响应。该项目计划通过利用纳米材料的光热特性来快速回收结合试剂来克服这一挑战。该方法包括三个目标。首先，一个超灵敏的PTR分析机制和表征分析性能将被证明。其次，将开发用于分析推广的高通量筛选管道。第三，将开发一种用于自动在线免疫调节剂分析的原型装置。这项研究具有创新意义，因为它为研究人员提供了一种获取时间分辨生理数据的新工具，这是提高我们理解生命规律知识的重要资源。在纳米传感器研究的基础上，教育活动将利用多模态生物传感技术提供的时间分辨生理数据，研究学生考试焦虑与学习成果之间的相互关系。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Continuous monitoring of biological and chemical markers within the human body represents a significant advancement in medical technology, offering comprehensive insights into an individual’s health status. The development of such monitoring capabilities is crucial for medical professionals managing patients with compromised immune systems—a condition responsible for a substantial number of fatalities in U.S. hospitals annually and one of the costliest to diagnose and manage. The ability to access patient immune status rapidly and frequently poses a challenge for doctors seeking to make informed clinical decisions, a reality underscored by the recent COVID-19 pandemic. The research project aims to develop a novel bio-monitoring technology that enables clinicians to directly assess the immune functions of patients at point of care. This will be accomplished by integrating nanomaterials and biomolecules into a novel diagnostic device. Beyond its medical applications, this biosensing technology has potential utility in environmental monitoring, water quality assessment, and the oversight of pharmaceutical production. Additionally, this project will explore the application of bio-monitoring technology to investigate the emotional responses during learning in students from diverse educational backgrounds. In the education study, the project will produce new learning resources, broaden research opportunities for students, and offer tailored research training programs to high school and college students in the STEM education pipeline. Understanding the rules of human immunology requires continuous access to immune system status, which can provide dynamic insights about immune functions in health and disease. Critical gaps exist in our knowledge of the underlying mechanisms that drive immune dysfunction, and we lack tools that can continuously monitor immune responses. There is a critical need for novel biosensing technologies that enable continuous immunologic monitoring, timely disease trajectory prediction, and tailored medical intervention. The overall goal of this project is to develop a novel Photothermal Recycling (PTR) biosensing technology that meets the bioanalytical needs of frequent, in-line immunomodulator monitoring. A major technical challenge in biochemical monitoring is achieving fast sensor response while maintaining high sensitivity and specificity. This project plans to overcome this challenge by leveraging photothermal properties of nanomaterials to rapidly recycle binding reagents. The approach encompasses three objectives. First, an ultra-sensitive PTR assay mechanism and characterize assay performance will be demonstrated. Second, a high-throughput screening pipeline for assay generalization will be developed. Third, a prototype device for automated in-line immunomodulator analysis will be developed. The research is innovative and significant because it gives researchers a new tool to access time-resolved physiological data, which is an important resource for advancing our knowledge in understanding the rules of life. Building on the nanosensor research, the education activities will investigate the interrelation of students’ test anxiety and learning outcomes using time-resolved physiological data enabled by multimodal biosensing.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.