MRI: Acquisition of high-resolution mass spectrometry system for metal-organic environmental and biological chemistry

金属对海洋、土壤和流域的健康有重大影响。许多金属是生命的必需营养素，通常限制生物活性，而其他金属则是人类活动的有害污染物。金属的生物吸收、毒性、运输和处理在很大程度上受微生物和植物产生的分子控制，这些分子与这些金属结合并使它们保持在溶液中。虽然人们普遍认为，许多溶解的金属主要存在于环境中的有机结合的形式，确定金属结合的有机分子的组成，起源和命运是一个分析的挑战，由于环境沃茨的高度复杂的化学。这项研究的调查人员将获得一种液相色谱质谱仪，以便对海洋中金属分布的有机分子的起源和命运进行新的研究，金属的微生物处理途径，金属与土壤中有机物之间的反应，改进水处理系统的设计，以去除与有机物相关的有害金属，以及开发用于环境取证的机器学习方法。该仪器还将通过涉及高中生、本科生、研究生和博士后学生的研讨会和项目为下一代环境分析师提供实践培训。低浓度的铁和其他微量营养元素金属限制了海洋大部分区域的生产力，但它们的化学形式在很大程度上是未知的。这种高分辨率质谱系统将用于分离和鉴定海洋沃茨中遇到的有机分子及其同位素体。作为美国GEOTRACES计划的一部分，我们将测量整个南大洋和南极大陆架的痕量金属和有机物种。这项工作将提供机制的洞察力的过程中，提供微量营养素的表面沃茨的慢性金属有限的南大洋。我们还将调查来自沿海沉积物，地下水和微生物实验室培养物的金属和有机物的形态，以建立特定生物/基因和金属结合代谢物之间的联系，这些代谢物控制金属在不同环境中的溶解度和吸收。此外，我们还将确定河流和废水中铜和其他人为金属的形态，以评估毒性和去除策略。我们研究的另一个重点将是开发机器学习算法，以基于高分辨率质谱数据开发环境过程的标记。这些进步有可能将元素循环的知识从经验描述转化为机械模型，通过考虑化学和生物多样性更好地解释和预测环境过程。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得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来支持。

Metals have a major impact on the health of the ocean, soils, and watersheds. Many metals are essential nutrients for life that often limit biological activity, while others are harmful contaminants from human activities. The biological uptake, toxicity, transport, and treatment of metals is largely controlled by molecules produced by microbes and plants that bind to these metals and keep them in solution. While it is widely recognized that many dissolved metals are mostly present as organic-bound forms in the environment, determining the composition, origin, and fate of metal-binding organic molecules is an analytical challenge due to the highly complex chemistry of environmental waters. The investigators in this study will acquire a liquid chromatography mass spectrometry instrument to enable new research on the origin and fate of organic molecules that govern metal distributions in the ocean, pathways for the microbial processing of metals, the reactions between metals and organic matter in soils, the design of improved water treatment systems that remove harmful metals associated with organic matter, and the development of machine learning approaches for environmental forensics. The instrument will also provide hands-on training of the next generation of environmental analysts through workshops and projects involving high school, undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral students.Low concentrations of iron and other micronutrient metals limit productivity across large sections of the ocean, but their chemical forms are largely unknown. This high resolving power mass spectrometry system will be used to separate and identify organic molecules and their isotopologues encountered in ocean waters. As part of the US GEOTRACES program, we will measure trace metal and organic speciation across the Southern Ocean and Antarctic shelf. This work will provide mechanistic insight into the processes that supply micronutrients to surface waters of the chronically metal limited Southern Ocean. We will also investigate the speciation of metals and organics sourced from coastal sediments, groundwater and microbial laboratory cultures to establish linkages between specific organisms/genes and metal binding metabolites that govern metal solubility and uptake across diverse environments. Furthermore, we will determine speciation of copper and other anthropogenic metals in river and wastewaters in order to assess toxicity and removal strategies. Another focus of our research will be to develop machine learning algorithms to develop markers of environmental processes based on high resolution mass spectrometry data. Such advancements have the potential to transform knowledge of elemental cycling from empirical descriptions to mechanistic models that better explain and predict environmental processes by accounting for chemical and biological diversity.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.