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

Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Pittsburgh have developed lipid nanoparticles that are designed to carry mRNA specifically to the pancreas. The researchers packaged mRNA instructions for a bioluminescent protein into lipid nanoparticles and then injected them into mice either intravenously or intraperitoneally (that is, directly into the fluid that surrounds the pancreas). Using the glowing protein to see where the mRNA had traveled, they found that intraperitoneal injection resulted in more abundant and more specific delivery to the pancreas, compared with intravenous injection.

Researchers from Drexel University, the University of Pennsylvania, Reading Hospital (Reading, PA), and Acuitas Therapeutics (Vancouver, Canada) have shown that lipid nanoparticles – a vital component of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines – stimulate innate immune cells more efficiently in younger individuals than older ones. The researchers stress that understanding the immune responses to lipid nanoparticles in the aged population may help to offer strategies to improve vaccines in the aged population, or even tailor vaccines that are specific for that population.

Engineers at MIT, the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and the University of Toronto have designed a new type of nanoparticle that can be administered to the lungs, where it can deliver messenger RNA encoding useful proteins. With further development, these nanoparticles could offer an inhalable treatment for cystic fibrosis and other diseases of the lungs, the researchers say. "This is the first demonstration of highly efficient delivery of RNA to the lungs in mice," says Daniel Anderson, a scientist involved in this study.

Researchers at the University of New Mexico have demonstrated that depending on their rotation frequencies, the radiative heat transfer between two rotating nanostructures can be increased, reduced, or even reversed with respect to the transfer that occurs in the absence of rotation. This discovery allows scientists to have a higher degree of control over the radiative heat transfer by making use of the rotation of the nanostructures.

Researchers from the University of Chicago and the University of Illinois Chicago have shown how to make MXenes – materials composed of many extremely thin layers of metal – more quickly and easily, with fewer toxic byproducts. The researchers discovered new chemical reactions that allow scientists to make MXenes from simple and inexpensive precursors. All scientists would need to do is mix chemicals with metals and then heat the mixture at 1,700°F. 

Research led by scientists from Virginia Commonwealth University, The Johns Hopkins University, and Shandong First Medical University (Qingdao, China) may make corneal transplants more successful by using nanoparticles to encapsulate the medication. Each nanoparticle encapsulates a drug called dexamethasone sodium phosphate, one of the most commonly used corticosteroids for various ocular diseases. By using the nanoparticles to control the release of the medicine over time, patients would require only one injection right after the corneal transplantation surgery without frequent eye drops.

Simulations on the Texas Advanced Computing Center's Frontera supercomputer have helped scientists at The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Macau (Macao, China) map, for the first time, the conditions that characterize polarons in two-dimensional (2D) materials. A polaron is a quasiparticle consisting of an electron and its surrounding distortions of atoms in a crystal lattice. Understanding polarons can help improve the performance and efficiency of touchscreens for phones and tablets and organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) of OLED TVs.

Researchers at North Carolina State University have demonstrated a caterpillar-like soft robot that can move forward and backward and can dip under narrow spaces. The caterpillar-bot's movement is driven by a novel pattern of silver nanowires that use heat to control the way the robot bends, allowing users to steer the robot in either direction.

In a major breakthrough in the fields of nanophotonics and ultrafast optics, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have demonstrated the ability to dynamically steer light pulses from conventional, so-called incoherent light sources. This ability to control light using a semiconductor device could allow low-power, relatively inexpensive sources like light-emitting diodes (LEDs) or flashlight bulbs to replace more powerful laser beams in new technologies such as holograms, remote sensing, self-driving cars, and high-speed communication.

Researchers from Syracuse University and the State University of New York-Upstate Medical University (Syracuse, NY) have devised a tiny, nano-sized sensor capable of detecting protein biomarkers in a sample at single-molecule precision. A tiny protein binder fuses to a small hole created in the membrane of a cell – known as a nanopore – which allows ionic solution to flow through it. When the sensor recognizes a targeted molecule, the ionic flow changes. This change in flow serves as the signal from the sensor that the biomarker has been found.