Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Development Of Multi-Functional Molecular Systems For Applications On Nanomaterial Surfaces, Jun Hyeong Park

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The glutathione-mediated, retro Michael-type addition reaction is demonstrated to take place at the interface of water-soluble, maleimide-functionalized gold nanoparticles (Maleimide-AuNP). The retro Michael-type addition can be blocked by hydrolyzing the Michael addition thioether adduct at the nanoparticle’s interface. This procedure “locks” the molecule of interest onto the Maleimide-AuNP template, ensuring no loss of the molecular cargo from the nanocarrier. On the other hand, the glutathione-mediated retro Michael-type addition reaction can be exploited for delivering a molecular payload. The Michael donor, 4-mercaptophenylacetic acid was modified with a terminal azide, allowing for addition of cargo through strain-promoted alkyne azide cycloadditions with various …

Compact Sensing Platforms Based On Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance, Zhutian Ding

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The development of plasmonic sensors mainly focuses on the improvement of their sensitivities that are approaching the theoretical limit. This work aims to propose, fabricate and characterize compact sensing platforms that are highly adaptable and easy to be miniaturized, without compromising their sensitivities. A plasmonic sensing system that allows the excitation of localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) by individual waveguide modes is presented conceptually and experimentally. Another compact sensing platform is proposed based on the ensemble hypothesis developed in this thesis.

Strategies For Photochemical And Thermal Modification Of Materials, Sara Ghiassian

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The modification of materials/surfaces is central to numerous applications ranging from opto-electronic devices to biomedical implants and drug delivery. Thus, there exists a high motivation for improving the methodologies which can be employed in order to modify surfaces in a selective and efficient fashion. One of the major goals of surface engineering is to control the chemical composition at the material interface. The fine control of the surface properties is a field of intense research as the performance of functional materials is strongly related to the processes and interactions that are occurring at the materials’ interface.

In general, the modification …

Organic Solar Cells: Electrodes, Performance Enhancement And Degradation Mechanisms, Reginald J. Bauld

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In this thesis I focus on a number of aspects associated with the fabrication and characterization of organic photovoltaics. Specifically, my work focuses on evaluating solution processed graphene electrodes for use in organic photovoltaics, improving the performance of indium tin oxide transparent contacts by coating them with Au nanoparticles, and understanding the degradation pathways of Poly(3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl): Phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (P3HT:PCBM) organic solar cells. In my work on graphene electrodes for organic solar cells I worked out a relationship between the sheet resistance and the film transmittance that is useful to optimize such electrodes. Investigation of organic solar cell degradation …

Photochromic Molecular Materials For The Controlled Organization Of Nanoparticles, Kristen Elise Snell

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The displacement of polystyrene nanoparticles promoted by bulk azo mass transfer using interferential light illumination will be discussed. For this a variety of different push pull small azo molecules were synthesis and characterized, changing the polarity, hydrophobicity and bulky groups around the azo moiety. These small dyes appear to orientate quicker than similarly report azo polymers, of entanglement of the azobenzene group in the polymeric backbone. These dyes were used to form surface relief grating on the thin films due to the bulk mass transfer. This mass transfer was exploited to align polystyrene nanoparticles in the crests and troughs of …

The Development Of Metal-Organic Compounds For Use As Molecular Imaging Agents, Emily J. Simpson

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Molecular imaging probes allow for the non-invasive diagnosis of many diseases through the use of a targeting entity for site specific delivery, as well as a signal for external visualization of probe accumulation in the body. This thesis will focus on the development of new approaches to synthesize targeting peptides and chelators for radionuclide incorporation towards the design of novel molecular imaging probes.

Histidine is a tridentate chelator that can be attached in a pendant fashion to a biomolecule in order to coordinate technetium-99m. Once coordinated, it forms a neutral complex that is capable of forming diastereomers with inverted stereochemistry …

Surface Functionalization And Bioconjugation Of Nanoparticles For Biomedical Applications, Longyan Chen

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Colloidal inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) have been attracting considerable interest in biomedicine, from drug and gene delivery to imaging, sensing and diagnostics. It is essential to modify the surface of nanoparticles to have enhanced biocompatibility and functionality for the in vitro and in vivo applications, especially in delivering locally and recognizing biomolecules. Herein, the goal of this research work is to develop advanced NPs with well-tailored surface functionalities and/or bio-functionality for the applications in cell tracking and analytes detection.

In the first project, quantum dots incorporating with gelatin nanoparticles (QDs-GNPs) have been developed for bioimaging applications. Two different approaches have been …

Fabricating Cost-Effective Nanostructures For Biomedical Applications, Erden Ertorer

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In this thesis we described inexpensive alternatives to fabricate nanostructures on planar substrates and provided example applications to discuss the efficiency of fabricated nanostructures.

The first method we described is forming large area systematically changing multi-shape nanoscale structures on a chip by laser interference lithography. We analyzed the fabricated structures at different substrate positions with respect to exposure time, exposure angle and associated light intensity profile. We presented experimental details related to the fabrication of symmetric and biaxial periodic nanostructures on photoresist, silicon surfaces, and ion-milled glass substrates. Behavior of osteoblasts and osteoclasts on the nanostructures was investigated. These results …