{"63030":{"#nid":"63030","#data":{"type":"news","title":"DARPA Awards $4.3M to Develop Biological, Chemical Threat Detector","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EA new class of sensors able to detect multiple biological and chemical threats simultaneously with unprecedented performance may soon be within reach thanks to the establishment of a multi-million dollar research center led by Georgia Institute of Technology engineers. \u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EBiological and chemical sensing are active research areas because of their applications in clinical screening, drug discovery, food safety, environmental monitoring and homeland security. Using integrated photonics, the new class of sensors will be capable of detecting chemical agents -- such as toxins, pollutants and trace gases -- and biological agents -- such as proteins, viruses and antibodies -- simultaneously on the same chip.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0022The proposed sensors will detect multiple biological and chemical threats on a compact integrated platform faster, less expensively and more sensitively than the current state-of-the-art sensors,\u0022 said the center\u0027s leader Ali Adibi, a professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Georgia Tech.  \n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EThe Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is funding the two-year $4.3 million center as one of its Centers in Integrated Photonics Engineering Research (CIPhER), which investigate innovative approaches that enable revolutionary advances in science, devices or systems. For its center, Georgia Tech is working with researchers from Emory University; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; University of California, Santa Cruz; and Yale University. The team also includes industry collaborators Rockwell Collins, Kotura, Santur Corporation and NanoRods.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003ETo create an integrated chip that will simultaneously detect multiple biological and chemical agents, the researchers need to achieve three major goals:\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u2022 Design and fabricate photonic and optomechanical structures to sense differences in a sample\u0027s refractive index, Raman emission, fluorescence, absorption and mass;\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u2022 Functionalize the sensor surface with coatings that chemical and biological agents will attach to and create differences that can be detected; and\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u2022 Develop the sample preparation method and microfluidic sample delivery device, and connect the device to the coated photonic structure.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EAdibi is leading the first thrust, which is primarily focused on fabricating the millimeter-square sensing structures and on-chip spectrometers that will enable multiplexing -- the detection of multiple agents using the same sensing modules. The sensors will detect changes in the refractive index, Raman emission, fluorescence, absorption spectra and optomechanical properties when a sample that includes specific biological or chemical particles interacts with the sensor coatings.  Combining information obtained from the five different sensing modalities will maximize the sensor specificity and minimize its false detection rate, the researchers say.\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0022The goal is to achieve very high sensitivity for each modality and investigate the advantages of each modality for different classes of biological and chemical agents in order to develop a clear set of guidelines for combining different modalities to achieve the desired performance for a specific set of agents,\u0022 explained Adibi.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EMassachusetts Institute of Technology chemistry professor Timothy Swager is leading the second part of this project, which aims to design surface coatings that will achieve maximum sensor specificity in detecting multiple biological and chemical agents. \n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0022We plan to develop glycan-based surface coatings to sense biological agents and polymer-based surface coatings to sense chemical agents,\u0022 noted Adibi.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EFor the third thrust, which is being led by Massachusetts Institute of Technology electrical engineering associate professor Jongyoon Han, the researchers will develop optimal sample preparation and delivery techniques. Their goal is to maximize the biological or chemical particle concentration in the sample and limit detection time to minutes.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0022In two years, we hope to have a lab-on-a-chip system that includes all of the sensing modalities with appropriate coatings and microfluidic delivery,\u0022 said Adibi. \u0022To show the feasibility of the technology, we plan to demonstrate the high sensitivity and high selectivity of each sensor individually and be able to use at least two of the sensing modalities simultaneously to detect two or three different chemical or biological agents.\u0022\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EIn addition to those already mentioned, this center also includes Georgia Tech chemistry and biochemistry professor Mostafa El-Sayed, Georgia Tech materials science and engineering professor Kenneth Sandhage, Georgia Tech Nanotechnology Research Center senior research scientist David Gottfried,  Emory University biochemistry chair Richard Cummings, University of California Santa Cruz electrical engineering professor Holger Schmidt, and Yale University electrical engineering associate professor Hong Tang.\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EResearch News \u0026amp; Publications Office\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nGeorgia Institute of Technology\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n75 Fifth Street, N.W., Suite 314\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nAtlanta, Georgia  30308  USA\u003C\/strong\u003E\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EMedia Relations Contacts:\u003C\/strong\u003E Abby Vogel Robinson (abby@innovate.gatech.edu; 404-385-3364) or John Toon (jtoon@gatech.edu; 404-894-6986)\n\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EWriter:\u003C\/strong\u003E Abby Vogel Robinson\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EDARPA has awarded Georgia Tech $4.3 million to develop a new class of sensors able to detect multiple biological and chemical threats simultaneously with unprecedented performance.\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"DARPA grant enables biological \u0026 chemical threat detector development."}],"uid":"27206","created_gmt":"2010-11-30 01:00:00","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:07:50","author":"Abby Vogel Robinson","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2010-12-01T00:00:00-05:00","iso_date":"2010-12-01T00:00:00-05:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"63031":{"id":"63031","type":"image","title":"Ali Adibi","body":null,"created":"1449176409","gmt_created":"2015-12-03 21:00:09","changed":"1475894549","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:42:29","alt":"Ali Adibi","file":{"fid":"191706","name":"tdg37932.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/tdg37932_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/tdg37932_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":1061765,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/tdg37932_0.jpg?itok=WTFrD7O-"}},"63032":{"id":"63032","type":"image","title":"Ali Adibi","body":null,"created":"1449176409","gmt_created":"2015-12-03 21:00:09","changed":"1475894549","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:42:29","alt":"Ali Adibi","file":{"fid":"191707","name":"trh37932.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/trh37932_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/trh37932_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":1255740,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/trh37932_0.jpg?itok=8cj-kYOQ"}}},"media_ids":["63031","63032"],"related_links":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.ece.gatech.edu\/faculty-staff\/fac_profiles\/bio.php?id=2","title":"Ali Adibi"},{"url":"http:\/\/www.ece.gatech.edu\/","title":"School of Electrical and Computer Engineering"}],"groups":[{"id":"1188","name":"Research Horizons"}],"categories":[{"id":"141","name":"Chemistry and Chemical Engineering"},{"id":"145","name":"Engineering"},{"id":"154","name":"Environment"},{"id":"146","name":"Life Sciences and Biology"},{"id":"135","name":"Research"},{"id":"150","name":"Physics and Physical Sciences"}],"keywords":[{"id":"11388","name":"absorption"},{"id":"11385","name":"antibodies"},{"id":"11379","name":"biologic"},{"id":"1364","name":"chemical"},{"id":"6891","name":"fluorescence"},{"id":"5340","name":"mass"},{"id":"7341","name":"microfluidic"},{"id":"2290","name":"photonics"},{"id":"11381","name":"pollutants"},{"id":"11383","name":"proteins"},{"id":"11387","name":"Raman emission"},{"id":"11386","name":"refractive index"},{"id":"167318","name":"sensor"},{"id":"11380","name":"toxins"},{"id":"11382","name":"trace gases"},{"id":"11384","name":"viruses"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EAbby Vogel Robinson\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EResearch News and Publications\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/www.gatech.edu\/contact\/index.html?id=avogel6\u0022\u003EContact Abby Vogel Robinson\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003E404-385-3364\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["abby@innovate.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}