Multi-modal Mass Spectrometric Imaging for Understanding the Biochemical Effects of Nanomaterials

在化学系化学测量和成像项目的支持下，马萨诸塞大学阿姆赫斯特分校的Richard Vachet教授、Vincent Rotello教授和他们的团队正在开发测量生物样品中纳米材料的新方法。纳米材料在越来越多的技术中发挥着重要作用，从消费品和工业应用到生物医学。为了正确地理解这些纳米材料在每种应用中的后果，需要新的测量方法来报告它们的分布和生化效应。Vachet教授和Rotello教授正在开发新的成像工具，可以同时为组织中的纳米材料提供两组信息。所提出的成像方法依赖于复杂的基于激光的质谱分析，它也可以提供光与纳米材料相互作用的基本信息。在这项资助中开发的新方法也带来了新的计算方法，将这些新成像方法和更传统的显微镜方法获得的数据结合起来，从而加深了可以从这些成像方法中提取的洞察力。本科生和研究生将参与该项目，这些学生将获得尖端质谱和纳米技术的培训，这两个领域具有广泛的重要性。Vachet/Rotello团队正在开发新的成像方法，将激光烧蚀电感耦合等离子质谱（LA-ICP MS）和基质辅助激光解吸/电离质谱（MALDI MS）结合起来，同时跟踪组织中的纳米材料和生物分子（如代谢物、脂质）。他们正在探索新的多模态图像分割方法，以更容易地识别亚器官特异性分子标记。他们还在开发新的计算方法来融合来自LA-ICP-MS成像，MALDI-MS成像和显微镜的图像。结合这些模式的图像将提高空间分辨率，增强图像中的化学信息。他们还合成了新的质量标签，可以共轭到任何纳米材料上，以改善多模态成像。在这个项目中开发的新软件可以免费提供给研究社区。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。

With support from the Chemical Measurement and Imaging Program in the Division of Chemistry, Professor Richard Vachet, Professor Vincent Rotello, and their groups at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst are developing new methods to measure nanomaterials in biological samples. Nanomaterials are important in a growing number of technologies, ranging from consumer goods and industrial applications to biomedicine. To properly understand the consequences of such nanomaterials in each application, new measurement methods are needed that can report on their distributions and biochemical effects. Professors Vachet and Rotello are developing new imaging tools that can simultaneously provide both sets of information for nanomaterials in tissues. The proposed imaging methods rely on sophisticated laser-based mass spectrometry that can also provide fundamental information about the interactions of light with nanomaterials. The new methods developed in this grant are also leading to new ways to computationally combine data obtained from these new imaging methods and more traditional microscopy methods, thereby deepening the insight that can be extracted from these imaging methods. A diverse group of undergraduate and graduate students will be involved in the project, and these students will obtain training in cutting-edge mass spectrometry and nanotechnology, two areas of broad importance.The Vachet/Rotello group is developing new imaging approaches that combine laser ablation inductively-coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP MS) and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization MS (MALDI MS) to simultaneously track nanomaterials and biomolecules (e.g. metabolites, lipids) in tissues. They are exploring new multi-modal image segmentation approaches to more easily identify sub-organ specific molecular markers. They are also developing new computational methods to fuse images from LA-ICP-MS imaging, MALDI-MS imaging, and microscopy. Combining images from these modalities will improve spatial resolution and enhance the chemical information present in the images. They are also synthesizing new mass tags that can be conjugated to any nanomaterial to improve multi-modal imaging. New software that is developed in this project is made freely available to the research community.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.