SBIR Phase I: Metal-implanted materials (MIMs) for fast, cost-effective and reproducible mixing

SBIR 第一阶段：金属植入材料 (MIM)，用于快速、经济高效且可重复的混合

• 批准号: 2303540
• 负责人: Elisabet Rosas
• 金额: $ 26.85万
• 依托单位: QUANTUMMED INC
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-08-01 至 2024-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2303540&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SBIR; Phase; Metal; implanted; materials

The broader impact of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project includes improving the reproducibility of automated life science workflows while simultaneously reducing their carbon footprint. Automated life science workflows are increasingly prevalent in medical (e.g., laboratory tests and diagnostics) and research (e.g., next generation sequencing) applications, and mixing is a ubiquitous and often repeatedly performed operation in these assays. The novel mixing technology to be developed will confer myriad benefits. By reducing assay turnaround times and improving assay reliability, it will decrease wait times for medical screening, diagnosis and monitoring, enabling faster diagnoses and treatments. By decreasing the materials costs of the assays, this technology may reduce the costs of medical testing and improve access to care. It also can enhance partnerships between academic and industry laboratories by giving academic laboratories access to industry workflows that are currently prohibitively expensive. Finally, by eliminating a substantial portion of the single-use plastic consumed by assays, this novel mixing technology will help curb the waste generated by life science assays, which will help alleviate the single-use plastic waste crisis. The proposed project will deliver an innovative mixing technology that is based on a photo-acoustic streaming phenomenon. Briefly, when glass implanted with metal nanoparticles (metal-implanted materials (MIMs)) is excited by a pulsed laser, it causes an adjacent fluid (liquid or gas) to begin streaming for the duration of the illumination. This streaming creates an opportunity to precisely control mixing, but key technical challenges include optimizing the MIMs’ form factor and devising an effective, yet also inexpensive, illumination system. The proposed project’s objectives address these challenges by: (i) evaluating the effectiveness of mixing solutions with a novel MIM form factor that can be incorporated easily into existing automated life science workflows, (ii) determining if functional MIMs can be fabricated in bulk by procuring them from a supplier and characterizing them for nanoparticle implantation and laser-induced solution streaming, and (iii) testing an alternative laser light source that powers mixing and consists of a low-cost light emitting diode (LED) laser.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.

这项小型企业创新研究（SBIR）I阶段项目的更广泛影响包括改善自动生命科学工作流的复制，同时减少其碳足迹。自动生命科学工作流程越来越普遍在医学（例如，实验室测试和诊断）和研究（例如下一代测序）应用中，并且混合在这些测定中是无处不在的，通常反复执行的操作。要开发的新型混合技术将会带来无数的好处。通过减少测定周转时间并提高测定可靠性，它将减少医疗筛查，诊断和监测的等待时间，从而更快地诊断和治疗。通过降低测定的材料成本，该技术可以降低医疗测试的成本并改善获得护理的机会。它还可以通过使学术实验室访问目前禁止昂贵的行业工作流程来增强学术和行业实验室之间的伙伴关系。最后，通过消除测定法消耗的单利塑料的很大一部分，这种新颖的混合技术将有助于遏制生命科学分析产生的废物，这将有助于减轻一次性的塑料废物危机。拟议的项目将提供基于光声流现象的创新混合技术。简而言之，当用金属纳米颗粒（金属植入材料（MIMS））植入的玻璃被脉冲激光激发时，它会导致相邻的液体（液体或气体）在照明期间开始流式传输。这种流媒体为精确控制混合而创造了机会，但是关键的技术挑战包括优化MIMS的外形并设计了一个有效但又便宜的照明系统。 The proposed project’s objectives address these challenges by: (i) evaluating the effectiveness of mixing solutions with a novel MIM form factor that can be incorporated easily into existing automated life science workflows, (ii) determining if functional MIMs can be fabricated in bulk by procuring them from a supplier and characterizing them for nanoparticle implantation and laser-induced solution streaming, and (iii) testing an alternative laser light source that权力混合和由低成本的发光二极管（LED）激光组成。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并使用基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛的影响评估标准，通过评估诚实地表示支持。