Functional nanomaterials for molecular diagnostics and imaging: contribution of electrokinetic methodologies towards an integrative approach

Seminar by Fanny d’Orlyé, Associate Professor at Chimie ParisTech, PSL University. The event is organised within the European project EELISA - European University

Abstract

The use of nanomaterials raises growing interests in various current emerging fields of research such as nanotechnologies, diagnosis assays and therapy. As the introduction of nanomaterials in physiological media may induce surface modifications and aggregation or size enlargement, their surface passivation is a very crucial challenge to prevent non-specific protein adsorption and thus extend their circulation time, but also to ensure their biocompatibility, in vivo stability, biodistribution and bioreactivity for specific targeting and drug delivery.
This lecture intends to give a critical overview of electrokinetic methodologies recently developed for allowing not only the complete characterization of new nanoprobes, on going from metallic particles to polymer- and peptide-based nanomaterials, but also for helping in their design and in the selection of chemical conditions relevant for their storage and further manipulation. The perspectives of new strategies to quantitatively characterize specific and non-specific interactions between multifunctional nanovectors and plasma proteins or the main components (phospholipids, integral proteins, carbohydrates) of cell membranes will be investigated. Eventually, the potentialities of such nanomaterials for the development of diagnostic assays and bioimaging technologies will be addressed.