| Grant number: | 15/08523-8 |
| Support Opportunities: | Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral |
| Start date: | July 01, 2015 |
| End date: | November 30, 2016 |
| Field of knowledge: | Engineering - Materials and Metallurgical Engineering - Nonmetallic Materials |
| Agreement: | Coordination of Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES) |
| Principal Investigator: | Anderson de Oliveira Lobo |
| Grantee: | Bruno Vinícius Manzolli Rodrigues |
| Host Institution: | Instituto de Pesquisa e Desenvolvimento (IP&D). Universidade do Vale do Paraíba (UNIVAP). São José dos Campos , SP, Brazil |
| Associated research grant: | 11/17877-7 - Development of new polymeric scaffolds by electrospinning technique with incorporation of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes and nanohidroxyapatite for bone tissue regeneration, AP.JP |
Abstract Alzheimer's disease (AD), a chronic neurodegenerative disease, is the most common form of dementia and affects more than 44 million of people in the World and more than 1 million only in Brazil. The diagnosis of AD in a very early stage is extremely necessary and desirable, since it is incurable and it worsens progressively until death. In order to estimate the risk or presence of this disease, AD's biomarkers, such as beta amyloid and ApoE4, are neurochemical indicators that can be detected in some physiological fluids such as CSF (cerebrospinal fluid), serum and plasma. However, up to date, the current methods of AD's biomarkers detection in such fluids do not present high sensitivity for early diagnosis and the costs are incompatible with the needed large screening. In this context, we propose the development and optimization of a fluorescent nanosensor based on the electrospinning of poly (vinyl alcohol) (PVA) and water-soluble graphene quantum dots (GQDs) on ITO coated glass slides, for detection of AD's biomarkers based on the fluorescence quenching of the GQDs. Given the three-dimensional and porous structure of the electrospun membrane and its high surface area to volume ratio, it is expected a high diffusion and adsorption of the AD's biomarkers. Blue photoluminescent GQDs will be prepared by incomplete carbonization of citric acid followed by dispersion in alkaline solution. GQDs afford in their structures carboxyl functional groups suitable for immobilization of antibodies, allowing an enhanced efficiency in the capturing and pre-concentrating of AD's biomarkers. The best conditions for electrospinning will be investigated considering the (inter)combination of different experimental parameters such as polymer and GQDs concentration; applied voltage; needle-collector distance and solution flow rate. The antibodies will be linked to the GQDs by peptide bonding between the amino groups from the Lys residues and the carboxyl groups from the GQDS, by using [N-(3-dimethylamino)propyl]-N-ethylcarbodiimide (EDC) previously activated with N-hydroxysulfosuccinimide (Sulfo-NHS). The structure and fluorescence properties of the PVA/GQDs hybrid membranes will be evaluated using fluorescence, scanning and transmission microscopies, as well as other relevant techniques of materials characterization. The developed nanodevice will be also tested in real clinical CSF, plasma and serum samples of patients who suffer from AD, aiming at the detection of beta amyloid and ApoE4. It is expected to obtain a high sensitive nanodevice for AD's biomarkers detection in order to diagnose this disease in a very early stage, as well as to provide reliable measures of its progress. (AU) | |
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