News from the NNI Community - Research Advances Funded by Agencies Participating in the NNI

Researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Ulster University in Belfast, UK, have reviewed leading work in subsurface nanometrology, the science of internal measurement at the nanoscale level, and have suggested that quantum sensing could become the foundation for the field's next era of discoveries. Potential applications could range from mapping intracellular structures for targeted drug delivery to characterizing quantum materials and nanostructures for the advancement of quantum computing.

Researchers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Cyta Therapeutics, Inc. (Lowell, MA) have used a nanogel-based carrier to deliver a drug exclusively to the liver of obese mice, effectively reversing their diet-induced disease. The researchers gave the drug – which mimics a synthetic thyroid hormone – daily to obese mice. The drug was packaged inside the nanogel and delivered to the mice through their abdominal cavities. After five weeks of treatment, the mice returned to a normal weight, their cholesterol levels dropped, and their liver inflammation was resolved.

Researchers from Case Western Reserve University and 4D Maker LLC in Okemos, MI, are developing a "smart packaging" system to monitor temperature fluctuations, moisture changes, and pathogens in perishable food products during transportation. A central feature of the system is a small, self-powered monitoring device consisting of flexible sensors and triboelectric nanogenerators, which convert mechanical energy into electricity.

A team of researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory, the University of Chicago, and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has devised a pathway for the mass manufacture of sensors that can simultaneously detect lead, mercury, and E. coli bacteria in flowing tap water. At the core of these sensors lies a one-nanometer-thick layer of carbon and oxygen atoms, which is coated on a silicon substrate. 

Using cutting-edge tools, scientists from the Center for Functional Nanomaterials, a user facility at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, and the Institute of Experimental Physics at the University of Warsaw have created a new layered structure with two-dimensional (2D) materials that exhibits a unique transfer of energy and charge. The team was able to get a more detailed picture of how long-distance energy transfer works in transition metal dichalcogenides – a class of materials structured like sandwiches with atomically thin layers.

Researchers from Northwestern University, the Houston Methodist Research Institute, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, New York University Langone School of Medicine, and the University of Texas at Austin have developed a novel single-cell nanopore genetic sequencing tool that accelerates sequencing analysis of same-cell genotypes and phenotypes in tumors. Single-cell nanopore RNA sequencing is a new type of genetic sequencing technique that can directly measure the full length of RNAs (instead of short strands of RNAs, which are commonly sequenced by current techniques).

Researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the University of Lille in France have identified a novel pathway to stabilize nanoscale precipitates in alloys. "In the last two decades, researchers have realized that having nanoscale inclusions in the structure can actually be very beneficial to the material," said Pascal Bellon, one of the scientists involved in this study. "The challenge is that spontaneously, these small particles want to grow bigger." The researchers found that when irradiated, the nanoscale precipitates would form, as expected, but instead of continuing to grow, they would reach a certain size and stop.

Scientists from Rice University, George Mason University, Johns Hopkins University, and Princeton University have discovered that tiny gold "seed" particles, a key ingredient in one of the most common nanoparticle recipes, are the same as gold buckyballs – 32-atom spherical molecules that are cousins of 60-carbon-atom molecules called buckyballs. Confirming that the widely used seeds were 32-gold-atom molecules rather than nanoparticles took years of effort, including state-of-the-art imaging and detailed theoretical analyses by the scientists.

Researchers from North Carolina State University, Iowa State University, and the University of British Columbia have developed a technique that uses a molecule-thin protective layer to control how the heat of a flame interacts with a material. "Our technique … employs a nanoscale thin film over a targeted material,” said Martin Thuo, one of the scientists involved in this study. “The thin film changes in response to the heat of the fire and regulates the amount of oxygen that can access the material. That means we can control the rate at which the material heats up." This work was performed in part at the Analytical Instrumentation Facility (AIF) at North Carolina State University, which is a member of the North Carolina Research Triangle Nanotechnology Network (RTNN), a site in the National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure (NNCI). 

Researchers at the University of Central Florida have developed new ways to produce energy and materials from methane, a greenhouse gas. The scientists invented a method to produce hydrogen from methane without releasing contaminants, such as higher polyaromatic compounds, carbon dioxide. or carbon monoxide. By using visible light and defect-engineered boron-rich photocatalysts, the innovation highlights a new functionality of nanomaterials for visible light-assisted capture and conversion of methane. Defect engineering refers to creating irregularly structured materials.