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

MRI：获取用于金属有机环境和生物化学的高分辨率质谱系统

• 批准号: 2216423
• 负责人: Rene Boiteau
• 金额: $ 64.46万
• 依托单位: Oregon 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: 2022-08-15 至 2024-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2216423&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: MRI; Acquisition; resolution; mass; spectrometry

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.

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要营养素，通常限制生物学活动，而其他金属则是人类活动中的有害污染物。金属的生物学摄取，毒性，运输和处理由由微生物和植物与这些金属结合并将其保持在溶液中的微生物和植物产生的分子控制。虽然广泛认识到，许多溶解的金属大多以环境中的有机结合形式存在，因此由于环境水的高度复杂的化学，确定金属结合有机分子的组成，起源和命运是一种分析挑战。这项研究中的研究人员将获取液相色谱质谱仪仪器，以实现对负责海洋中金属分布的有机分子的起源和命运的新研究，用于金属的微生物加工的途径，金属和有机物之间的反应，土壤和土壤中的有机物之间的反应，改善了与有机金属相关的有害金属和机器学习相关的有害水的设计。该仪器还将通过涉及高中，本科，研究生和博士后学生的研讨会和项目来提供下一代环境分析师的动手培训。铁和其他微量营养素的浓度限制了整个海洋大区域的生产力，但是它们的化学形式的浓度很大。这种高分辨率的电源质谱系统将用于分离和识别在海水中遇到的有机分子及其同位素分子。作为美国Geotraces计划的一部分，我们将测量整个南大洋和南极架子的痕量金属和有机物种形成。这项工作将提供机械性的洞察力，以了解为慢性金属有限南大洋的地表水提供微量营养素的过程。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物种，以在特定的生物/基因/基因和金属结合代谢物之间建立联系，这些代谢物在不同的环境中控制金属溶解度和吸收。此外，我们将确定河流和废水中铜和其他人为金属的物种形成，以评估毒性和去除策略。我们研究的另一个重点是开发机器学习算法，以基于高分辨率质谱数据来开发环境过程的标记。这些进步有可能通过考虑化学和生物学多样性来改变对元素循环的知识，从经验描述转变为更好地解释和预测环境过程的机械模型。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子和更广泛影响的审查标准来通过评估来支持的。