MRI: Development of an Optical Super-resolution Instrument for Measuring Concentration Profiles and Diffusion Dynamics in Thin Films

MRI：开发用于测量薄膜中的浓度分布和扩散动力学的光学超分辨率仪器

• 批准号: 2215742
• 负责人: William Ducker
• 金额: $ 53.04万
• 依托单位: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-09-01 至 2025-08-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2215742&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: MRI; Development; Optical; Super; resolution

This is a project to develop an instrument that will enable new discoveries about material interfaces. A vast range of scientifically and technologically important processes occur at interfaces between solids and liquids. For example, the adhesion of one material to another, the cleaning and disinfection of hospital surfaces, the charging of batteries, and the recovery of oil are all processes that occur at interfaces between solids and liquids. The project will develop a new type of microscopy that will reveal the microscopic details of these interfaces in greater detail and at much greater speed than previously obtainable. The microscope will make it possible to observe changes in structure as quickly as one-millionth of a second. Such high speeds are required to help researchers understand and engineers improve industrial and medical processes that increase the nation’s productivity and well-being. An integral part of the project will be to train future generations of scientists and engineers. The project will provide training in the following areas (1) female high school students, (2) undergraduate students, and (3) students studying to complete Ph.D. programs. Such students go on to provide the workforce that is trained for work in high-tech industries as well as the future generation of researchers. The instrument developed in this project will implement a RESOLFT (Reversible Saturable Optical Fluorescence Transitions) optical super-resolution microscopy technique adapted to study the distribution and dynamics of fluorescently labelled species at solid–liquid interfaces. Specifically, the instrument will be optimized for the highest possible axial resolution through the interference of two counterpropagating beams focused at the interface, and make use of the Ground State Depletion (GSD) modality. It will enable axial resolution as high as 10 nm while studying time-evolution of processes down to 0.25 microseconds, all while maintaining lateral resolution of a standard confocal microscope. The combination of high-resolution profiling and fast time resolution allows the instrument to address a range of unmet characterization needs in materials science, surface science, electrochemistry, polymer science, and adjacent fields. Examples of systems that could be studied with the instrument include spatial distribution of polymers and ions, which is crucial for antimicrobial performance, interactions between biomolecules and interfaces, such as polymers with cell membranes, the dynamics of nanoparticle self-assembly on surfaces, which must be understood to harness self-assembly for practical applications, and dynamics of ion transport near electrodes, which is of great interest in batteries and other electrochemical systems.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.

该项目旨在开发一种仪器，使人们能够对发生在固体和液体界面上的一系列具有科学和技术意义的过程产生新的认识，例如一种材料与另一种材料的粘附、清洁和消毒。医院表面、电池充电和石油回收都是发生在固体和液体界面的过程，该项目将开发一种新型显微镜，它将更详细地揭示这些界面的微观细节。显微镜将能够以百万分之一秒的速度观察结构变化，以帮助研究人员和工程师改进工业和医疗流程，从而提高国家的生产力和水平。该项目的一个组成部分是培养未来的科学家和工程师。该项目将提供以下领域的培训：(1) 女高中生，(2) 本科生，(3) 学生。这些学生继续提供博士学位。该项目开发的仪器将实施适用于研究分布和分布的 RESOLFT（可逆饱和光学荧光跃迁）光学超分辨率显微镜技术。具体来说，该仪器将通过聚焦在界面上的两个反向传播光束的干涉来优化，以获得尽可能高的轴向分辨率，并利用地面。状态耗尽 (GSD) 模式可实现高达 10 nm 的轴向分辨率，同时研究低至 0.25 微秒的过程时间演化，同时保持标准共焦显微镜的横向分辨率。分辨率使仪器能够解决材料科学、表面科学、电化学、聚合物科学和邻近领域中一系列未满足的表征需求，可以使用该仪器研究的系统示例包括聚合物的空间分布。和离子，这对于抗菌性能至关重要，生物分子和界面之间的相互作用，例如具有细胞膜的聚合物，表面纳米粒子自组装的动力学，必须理解这一点以利用自组装进行实际应用，以及离子动力学该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。