Date of Award

11-1-2008

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Organizational Unit

College of Natual Science and Mathematics

First Advisor

Todd A. Wells

Second Advisor

Donald Stedman

Third Advisor

Keith Miller

Fourth Advisor

Susan Sadler

Keywords

Biosensors, Infrared, PS nanospheres

Abstract

The use of various polymer supports adhering phospholipid multibilayers to an internal reflection element have been investigated. The polymer supports studied range from polystyrene (PS), and 100 nm wide PS nanospheres to triethylaminated poly(vinyl benzyl chloride) (PVBC). The PS nanospheres showed the most promise as an adhesion layer since they appear to be the most robust with repeated washings. They also appear to stabilize their adjacent phospholipid multibilayer by increasing the lipid melting temperature. The triethylaminated DVBC also provided an increase of lipid melting temperature, but not quite to the same degree as the PS nanospheres. The cooperativity of such systems is much greater than without an adhesion layer. It is believed that in the case of PS nanospheres, a slight negative charge interacts with the polar head groups of the phospholipid multibilayer, thus leading to an increase in cooperativity. The triethylaminated DVBC is believed to interdigitate between the phospholipid molecules in a way such that the positively charged nitrogen atom interacts directly with the negatively charged phosphate group located on the phospholipid molecules, thus giving rise to its relatively high cooperativity and lower melting temperature than the uncharged polymers and nanobeads. The PS nanosphere polymer support was shown to be an effective platform for biosensors. Myoglobin based biosensors, using PS nanosphere supports, showed that myoglobin retains its native ligand binding ability.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Ignacio Joseph Garcia

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

148 p.

Discipline

Biochemistry

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