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UNLoC-ZiLEM: Real-Time Growth and Biomolecular Interactions of Plant Derived Zinc Oxide Nanostructures Using Universal Nanofluidic Lab-on-a-Chip in Liquid-phase Electron and Single-Molecule Fluorescence Microscopy

Echtzeit-Wachstum und biomolekulare Wechselwirkungen von pflanzlichen Zinkoxid-Nanostrukturen unter Verwendung des universellen Nanofluidik-Lab-on-a-Chip in Flüssigphasen-Elektronen- und Einzelmolekül-Fluoreszenzmikroskopie

Researchers: Chinmay KV, Tobias Meyer, Moumita Ghosh, Eswar Rao, G Mohan Rao, Michael Seibt, Cynthia A. Volkert, and Siddharth Ghosh.

Plant derived nanomaterials for healthcare use can be effective as well as environment friendly - green synthesis. However, to obtain a high yield of final nanomaterial of interest and its efficacy, a fundamental high-resolution investigation of the synthesis mechanism and synthesized materials along with their interactions with physiologically relevant biomolecules in real time are required. One such materials is zinc oxide. Its physiological relevance is extremely high – source of zinc (an essential metal for human’s biological processes) and drug delivery. Plant derived ZnO nanostructures is not new, but their growth mechanism has not been studied in real time, which can in turn provide larger yield in industrial production. ZnO being piezoelectric, its nanostructures can play some crucial roles in neuronal health beside other biological importance. UNLoC-ZiLEM integrates nanomaterial synthesis, nanofluidics, and electron-optics from India and Germany to investigate the growth of ZnO nanostructures from plant derived chemicals in real time using a universal lab-on-a-chip i.e. compatible for liquid cell electron microscopy and single-molecule confocal fluorescence microscopy. Nanomaterial synthesis of ZnO will be performed using plant metabolites. Piezoelectric effect (a potential stimulated therapy) of these nanostructures will be studied in presence of neurotransmitters and external electron fields. These can be achieved if we can create an effective nanofluidic environment to manipulate individual ZnO nanoparticles at single-particle level inside the high vacuum for electron microscopy and simultaneously, within a diffraction limited confocal volume of a laser beam. A significant amount of nanoengineering will be performed to make the nanofluidic environment universally compatible for electron-optics and light-optics - universal nanofluidic lab-on-a-chip (UNLoC).