Optimizing the yield and selectivity of high purity nanoparticle clusters

Rapid Nanoparticle Characterization

“…Pease further extended this formulation to determine the selectivity of specific cluster compositions (dimers, trimers, etc. ), as will be discussed subsequently [Pease, 2011a].…”

“…Statistical compilation shows the standard deviation on the diameter of these purified particles to be 1.2 nm and 1.4 nm for the two sizes, respectively, leading to coefficients of variation of <5% [Anumolu et al, 2011]. This manufacturing precision meets or exceeds that of metallic nanoparticles and rivals that of biologically assembled particles such as viruses [Cole et al, 2009;Lute et al, 2008;Pease, 2011a;Pease et al, 2007]. These results provide the first compelling evidence that ES-DMA can both generate and purify polymeric nanoparticles with high dimensional uniformity without the addition of hazardous solvents.…”

“…quantum dots, silver particles, etc.) [Elzey & Grassian, 2010;Pease, 2011a]. Anumolu, et al, fabricated nanoparticles using ES-DMA from recombinant silk elastin-like protein polymers (SELPs) by encapsulating multiple polymer strands in evaporating electrospray droplets.…”

“…By comparing the conjugate size in ES-DMA size distributions with that of individual QDs and the lambda phage, the number of QDs attached to the bacteriophage was determined using Eq. 5 by modeling the QD-phage conjugates as clusters of spheres (i.e., the phage) and rods (the streptaviding coated QDs) [Pease, 2011a]. More recently Tsai, et al, studied viral neutralization by quantifying antibody-virus binding .…”

“…To enhance the yield and purity (i.e., how many nominally threeparticle clusters actually contain three particles), Pease modeled the ES-DMA technique as a function of nanoparticle properties (size, concentration, etc.) using Monte Carlo simulations [Pease, 2011a]. Figure 12a shows that tuning the initial solution concentration of nanoparticles optimizes the yield of each kind of cluster.…”