Tunable Nanocomposites for Smart Materials and Technology Platform

我请求国家科学研究委员会（NSERC）拨款189,525.00美元，为期五年，以支持我开发智能材料和技术平台的研究计划，该平台使用对环境变化高度敏感的新型可调谐纳米材料。智能材料和技术是感知环境事件，处理感官信息，然后对环境采取行动的物体。它们应该具有内在的或嵌入的快速反应和自我驱动能力，并表现出对多个刺激状态的实时反应，离散的，可预测的和局部的激活事件。这种材料的新候选者是陶瓷纳米颗粒，因为它们的特性可以很容易地调整和定制，以满足所需的用途。例如，金属氧化物纳米陶瓷可以很容易地形成中空的纳米颗粒，并且具有独特的磁性和自旋电子行为。因此，纳米陶瓷可以同时用于催化纳米颗粒的感觉和微载体或作为纳米反应器。

I am requesting funding in tune of $189,525.00 from NSERC Discovery grant for a span of five years to support my research program of developing a Smart Material and Technology Platform using novel and tuneable nanomaterials with highly sensitivity to milieu changes. Smart materials and technologies are objects that sense environmental events, process the sensory information, and then act on the environment. They should have intrinsic or embedded quick response and self-actuation capabilities and exhibit characteristics, including responding in real-time, to more than one stimulating state, discretely, predictably and locally to the activating' event. Novel candidates for such materials are ceramic nanoparticles, because their properties can be easily tuned and tailored to desired use. For instance, metal oxide nanoceramic can be easily formed into hollowed nanoparticles, as well as have unique magnetic and spintronic behaviors. As such, the nanoceramics can be simultaneously used in sensory and micro-carriers of catalytic nanoparticles or act as nano-reactors. Specifically, the requested funding will support fundamental research to develop methods of fabricating and functionalizing hollowed ceramic nanomaterial with tailored and tuneable properties to support the development of smart technology platforms. During formation of ceramic material, there is a directional flow of material across an interface, which can lead to the formation of holes in the atomic lattice - a process known as the Kirkendall effect forming hollowed nanoparticles or nanoshells, which can be used as entrapment system for loading, storage, and controlled release of reactive components. When hollowed structure are combined with magnetic properties, such ceramic nanomaterial can be used to develop in situ sensing devices, capable of communicating wirelessly to a monitoring receiver. Currently, my research programme has two on-going research projects to benefit from the support, namely: (a) developing Smart Packaging Materials (SPMs) for prolonging storage and shelf-life of perishable food products. SPM will require the hollowed ceramic nanoparticles to encapsulate gas-scavenging material (e.g. ethylene responsible for fruit ripening or oxygen responsible for meat and dairy products degradation). Good examples include aluminum-silicate hollow cylinders (i.e., halloysite clay nanotubes), capable to load and sustained release of chemical agent; and, (b) developing Smart Wound-dressing Material (SWMs) for real-time monitoring of the wound-healing process while still the wound is still dressed. The SWMs require magnetic nanoceramic embedded into the gauze fibre, which would response to wound healing biomarker (e.g. temperature gradient and gas release, like H2O2) by changing their magnetism and spintronic behaviour.