**Partner 21 - The Science of Small**

**Announcer**

This time on Partners, it's the Science of Small...From corn-based
micro-scaffolds that promote smooth skin growth to minute protein
sensors that expose harmful bacteria at the molecular level. From
nano-scale mats that reveal unsafe material with a mere swipe of a cloth
to mini-trackers that uncover pollution problems in our water supply.
Researchers are exploring the power of the next great frontier -
nanotechnology.

Number range CHAPTERWelcome to Partners! In the next half-hour, we'll
travel the nation and see breakthrough work in research, education and
Extension.

That's what CSREES is all about - helping universities generate valuable
knowledge for those who need it\...and educating our next generation of
Americans.

And now, it's time for Partners!

**Narrator**

For millennia, we humans have viewed the world simply by what was
readily seen, easily observed. a waterfall... a forest... the sky above.

But as scientific exploration expanded, so did other ways of perceiving
our surroundings. Theories on atoms, molecules and their subdivisions
became established, and how we looked at and interfaced with our world
changed forever.

Today, the scrutiny has delved even deeper to that of the nanometer. A
nanometer is one *billionth* of a meter.To understand just how small
that is, the length of a typical bacterium, as seen through this
microscope, is 200 nanometers.

The diameter of a strand of DNA? A mere 2 nanometers.

Or consider this...

If an average highway lane represents a string of nanometers, it would
take 568, 818 miles of road to equal just one yard. In other words, over
22 times around the globe. That's more than two times the distance from
earth to our moon.

By working at this tiny, miniscule scale, researchers are learning how
manipulate matter like never before. In this the brave, new science of
nanotechnology, the increased surface area upon which to work is
exponential, and that opens up possibilities unimaginable until now.

In the next half hour, we'll venture into this new frontier of the nano
technology - one that CSREES-funded researchers are just beginning to
understand its potential power for reshaping our future. And now,
Partners Video Magazine presents, *The Science of Small...*

**Margaret Frey**

*A nano-fiber is about 1/500 of human hair. the fibers that we work with
are... around a hundred nanometers in diameter...As we look at
microscope images of these fibers we almost never see any ends we only
see the size of the fiber but they do seem to be very, very long  so the
fabrics that you see could possibly be made of one single fiber just
moving back and forth just tangled to make that fabric.*

**Narrator**

Margaret Frey has worked with traditional fabrics for much of her
career. But in recent years, she has daringly entered into the science
of small.

**Margaret Frey**

*As the diameter of the fiber gets smaller and smaller, then the given
weight of fiber has a more and more surface. We are trying to find ways
to use that surface to do some pretty special things.*

*It causes the fabric to become more absorbent then an equivalent amount
of a conventional fabric. It also gives a lot of area a lot of surface
area where we can capture and detect biohazards. I wanted to really look
at what this could mean for fabrics and making fabrics that could do
something special.*

**Narrator**

With CSREES funding, Margaret and her Cornell team focused on biohazard
detection. The first step was to make the fibers from a time-tested
process known as electrospinning.

**Margaret Frey**

*We apply high voltage to droplet, something in the order of 15,000
volts...a very fine jet of polymer will erupt from the surface of that
droplet and is collected over on an electrical ground some distance away
the path that* *the fiber takes is very long it whips back and forth in
between that space during that time it cools down and the solvent
evaporates. And the fibers stretched out to a thinner and thinner
diameter. So using this technique, we're able to make the nano-fibers
much smaller than anything you are able to make using mechanical
forces.*

**Narrator**

The next challenge was to find a way to bond a biohazard detector to the
fiber. The team discovered that a Vitamin B material called biotin fit
the bill.

**Margaret Frey**

*We figured out that once we incorporated the biotin into the fibers,
then we could use the fabric platform to do biohazard sensing. I think
of this whole system as a tinker toy.*

**Narrator**

The researchers added a bonding protein, which easily combined with the
biotin. This mix of materials proved successful in rapidly detecting E.
coli bacteria in lab experiments.

**Margaret Frey**

*Detecting that E. coli for the first time was definitely a great day.
You know, we actually showed that this does work! There's places where
contamination a critical issue that needs to be identified very rapidly
so one possibility that I personally see is transmission of
infections in hospitals. So if you have had a hospital room that's had a
contagious patient in it perhaps the supervisor of (the cleaning
crew*-at #3/34:57)*could go through behind* *them - sample all the
surfaces and confirm that they are no longer able to detect anthrax, or
sepsis ...or pneumonia...in that room and its ready for the next patient
to go into and not worry about contracting  a new disease while in the
hospital.* *Possibly quality control in food packaging if your in a
location were you are processing lots of vegetables or really almost any
kind of food you could work out a system for sampling surfaces and then
confirming that, 'Oh, we got some form of E. coli present or no we
don't.'*

**Narrator**

Super Cloth could also help identify germs in the home. For instance,
salmonella from chicken - or other food borne bugs - could easily be
detected in the kitchen by a mere swipe of the cloth.

**Margaret Frey**

*Having a rapid yes/no response and the possibility that this could be
done by just the general public is another goal for this project.*

**Narrator**

The Cornell team wants to develop the fabric so that would it will
reveal a bright color upon identifying an unsafe bacterium.

**Margaret Frey on camera**

*Right now, it's a two-step process. One is collection. One is
detection. But ideally, we can move that to a one- step process that the
color would develop on capture of the target material and we don't think
it's going to be easy but we do think its going to be possible.
Detecting pathogens is definitely been possible but by incorporating
this nanotechnology, we got something that's very small, very portable
able to do a lot of work on a very small platform - a very a
little piece of fabric the end of  a Q-tip, something like this.* *This
interface between putting together the fiber science... and the
biological science has been one the exciting challenges in this
project.*

**Announcer**

CSREES has funded other food safety nanotechnology projects. At Clemson
University, researchers are developing sticky, adhesive nano particles
that reduce food-borne pathogens in poultry meat products.

**Narrator**

It was in 1948 that two university students developed the first barcode.
In the last 60 years, this innovative identification system has
infiltrated everyday life -- from retail stores to industrial
documentation. But in the science of small, barcodes are taking on a
totally new shape -- one undetectable by the human eye.

**Dan Luo**

*DNA barcodes are very, very small. They are Nano scale so the typical
barcode - one molecule- probable around 50 nanometers or smaller and one
nanometer one billionth of meter.   *

**Narrator**

These particles are so small that Dan Luo and his colleagues can only
see them with sophisticated laboratory machines. Working at the
molecular level, the team is building color-coded probes - synthetic
tree-shaped DNA - capable of tagging pathogens in the human body. And
these disease detectors go far beyond the world of medicine.

**Dan Luo**

*There's many agricultural applications. For example, you can use that
to potentially diagnose the infections in a farm you can use* (nano
barcodes) *to trace the bacteria in a compost. It's very much like the
barcodes you see in grocery stores.*

**Narrator**

At the heart of this technology is Luo's ability to master the structure
of DNA. By synthesizing three single strands - each complementary to one
of the others along half its length - the researchers have created a
Y-shaped DNA.

**Dan Luo**

*It took us a whole year to get the sequence right shape for the Y-DNA.*

**Narrator**

The next step was to build a tree-shaped DNA that is nano
particle-friendly.

**Dan Luo**

*Each color here represents a Y-shaped DNA.*

**Narrator**

The bonding of these elements is made possible by using an enzyme- a
protein that accelerates chemical reactions.

**Dan Luo**

*That's the power of our nano barcode. We utilize the enzymes to do the
connection. The enzyme has been evolved billions of years to do that
work. So it's a very, very efficient process. That's the process
actually, also happens inside our body or any living organism.* *For
Nano barcode*(s)*, we are going in two different directions. One
direction, we want to enhance the sensitivity. In particular, can we do
one-molecule detection? That will be the ultimate sensitivity.* *The
other direction is trying to make a portable detector so that we don't
have to send the sample to the lab to make the detection. Rather, we can
do the detection in the field or on the bedside of a hospital or in a
farm or in a local environment.*

**Narrator**

This is a prototype model of the portable detector that Luo soon expects
to become a reality.

**Dan Luo**

*Ultimately, it will interface with either a laptop or PDA. Then you can
detect right in the battlefield, for example, or in a farm, what caused
the infection. And then you can make a decision right there. You don't
have to wait. It is giving us much more potential and many more
opportunities to find new materials and the new devices. We've been
trying to make materials out of DNA that* (are) *robust, efficient and
low-cost - that can ultimately be used by people.*

**Announcer**

[CSREES partners with 26 other federal agencies in the National
Nanotechnology Initiative. Its goal? to support a world-class research
aimed at realizing the full potential of
nanotechnology.](http://www.nano.gov/)

**Graciela Padua**

*Zein is a protein that you find in corn. Zein has been known for a very
long time. In fact, it was one of the first proteins that was completely
and thoroughly studied back in the early 1900's.*

**Narrator**

Graciela Padua is a nanotechnologist at the University of Illinois. Her
fascination with the corn protein, zein (pronounced- zeen) goes far
beyond its conventional uses. This yellow granular wonder has been used
in making biodegradable plastic film for the food industries, for
coatings to lock in flavor of nuts or raisins, and for pills in the
pharmaceutical industry. But it is zein's unique molecular structure
that is key.

**Graciela Padua**

*Zein is a unique molecule.* *Being a storage protein, perhaps, it has a
very tightly neat package and structure. And we take advantage of that.
Most proteins have shapes that are not amendable for manipulation. Zein
is a material protein that will always respond in the same
way-Researcher friendly.*

**Narrator**

In the science of small, Padua likens her activities with zein
structures at the nano level to that of building with Lego blocks --
working with spiked surfaces that allow her to build 'towers' by
combining matter at the molecular level. In nano technology, what we do
is we have a substrate, and with special equipment we draw blueprints on
a substrate. So once we have the blue print, we can add the towers on
top of them...

**Graciela Padua**

*We can draw a blue print of a structure then let the protein stick to
the specific points and therefore build up a structure out of the blue
print. Many different things can be made out of this protein.*

**Narrator**

Scaffolds are one such thing that can be built of zein at the nano
level. These promise to provide smooth platforms for the growing of
healthy, new skin -- a real boon to burn victims and others in
post-operative situations.

**Graciela Padua**

*The first idea was to use it as a skin replacement mostly because zein
tends to form layers. So since skin is made out of layers, we thought we
have possibilities. Here, it is possible to make layers out of zein
therefore cell layers analogous to skin. We get* (Zein) *to stick to
some surfaces and not stick to others. And that's how we play with*
(It)*.* It *is a protein that is biodegradable. It's compatible with
cells. It doesn't hurt or damage or kill the cells. So they are
comfortable around it.*

*We take advantage of a process called self assembly and that's because
our protein has a very distinct size, if you wish. It is a neatly packed
brick-like molecule that has a different size, and that allows it to
connect to one another and build different structures.*

**Narrator**

Another zein structure under development at the University of Illinois
is the nano-tube. Padua foresees a medical scenario where this structure
would carry a drug to targeted, infectious site within the human body
with pin-point accuracy. The benefit? Only miniscule amounts of
medicine, like chemo therapy drugs, would be needed.

**Graciela Padua**

*Under the right conditions zein can roll up and form tubes or cylinders
that can carry compounds inside. There are guiding molecules that will
find their way to the... target and once at the target they will stick
to the tissues, and then the medicine will be emptied out and delivered
to the right place.* *We think this can be used to transport drugs or
other kinds of compounds into the body*

**Narrator**

But there are challenges working in the nano world due to the very
nature of everything being small.

**Graciela Padua**

*A speck of dust when you are talking about nano scale is a huge
boulder. We use clean rooms to make sure that all the dust is out of our
environment so that we can look at the molecules. We're talking about an
instrument that has very high precision a few nanometers in depth.*

**Narrator**

The University of Illinois team uses the powerful atomic force
microscope, a scanning probe that allows researchers to work in a
3-dimensional nano environment.

**Graciela Padua**

*The possibility to manipulate matter and molecules - to form a specific
outcome. The advent of very fine microscopes and technology that allows
us to look at what we are doing it gives us a real power of what can be
done.*

**Announcer**

By 2015, the global impact of products where nanotechnology plays a key
role will be approximately \$1 trillion annually, and will require a
highly trained workforce of two million people.

**Todd Walter**

*It's probably the major water quality issue in the country. And it's
not only agriculture. It's not only septic fields. It's things like
radiation that's leaking out of the old military sites things that kind
of distribute broadly in the landscape*.

**Narrator**

What researcher Todd Walter is talking about is non-point source
pollution -- those elusive, unseen places that are the source of
contamination that threaten the purity of America's waters.

**Todd Walter**

*What would be great is if we can find those sources, if we can take the
non-point part out of the equation. Scientist have for a long time tried
to trace pathways in the environment. What we really would like is some
kind of a tracer put in the environment and we could have unique
characteristics such that we could put one tracer in one part of the
landscape and another one in a  another part of the landscape, and then
when they get to the stream - be able to tell them apart from one
another. But we want them to move the same way.*

**Narrator**

In the Science of Small, Walter hopes to design nano-scale tracers -
miniscule particles engineered to match the shapes of specific
contaminates. If successful, the technology has the potential to
eliminate the term, "non point-source" from our vocabulary.

**Todd Walter**

*Nano technology gives us the ability to precisely control how
these particles behave ... in the environment and gives us the ability
to make... those unique labels that allows us to tell one particle from
another particle. It's really that control at very, very small
scales that Nano technology brings.*

**Dan Luo**

*So it's the surface property of the sand...*

**Todd Walter**

*Dan is really the designer of these Nano particles.*

**Narrator**

Researcher Dan Luo collaborated with Todd on the non-point source
pollution problem. His nano barcode technology allows the scientists to
track the particles through the environment.

**Dan Luo**

*We want to overcome this no point-problem so by using barcode*(s)*, we
can identify multiple points simultaneously from downstream.* *Because
there is so many different places that can contribute to the pollution
and in order to separate them and to distinguish them, you need a tool
such as a barcode to detect them.*

**Todd Walter**

*We use DNA-based coding in our microspheres...*

**Narrator**

Todd's 'ball and yarn' demonstration shows how the nano-barcodes are
integrated into the microspheres - detectors that seek out origins of
pollution.

**Todd Walter**

*One of the things that we have been able to do with Nano technology is
actually embed tiny little pieces of paramagnetic material - basically
iron- inside these little spheres or little tracers and then we can use
magnets to actually pull them out of there.*

**Narrator**

The experimentation began on a small scale, testing tracer movements
through just a few inches of sand in a glass tube.

**Todd Walter**

*We did that because we wanted to be able to look at what was happening
under a microscope as these tracers moved through sand, and how they
were interacting with the sand. What Dan had done is put a little dye in
inside these tracers that fluoresced so that we can see them on a
microscope image. We found that that the particles seemed to be moving
through the soil in a very similar way that... microorganisms move
through the soil.* *So we've gone from that scale up to now we're
looking a small plots on parking lots 10ft by 10 ft perhaps.*

**Narrator**

Todd's goal in this outside experiment is to follow the flow. By
simulating rain, he's testing how well the tracers travel across the
parking lot. The samples, retrieved at the sewer inlet, are later
checked to see how many particles made it across the pavement.

**Todd Walter**

*These tracers might ultimately be a good proxy for the movement of
microorganisms in water through a watershed. It gives us the ability to
precisely control the geometry and the characteristics of very, very
small particles. Ideally, we would love to have a chemical that
dissolved in the water. But we're not at the point where we can make
unique, soluble chemicals yet. But we can still make things that are
pretty small. We hope to actually scale up to a full parking lot say two
or three acres.    *

*Imagine a watershed were we know there is sewage getting into the
stream, and we don't know were its coming from. We could take these
tracers and we could have one called Tracer A, and dump it down one
person's toilet. Get another tracer, Tracer B - we can distinguish
from A - and put it down another. And so on through the whole watershed.
Then, we just sample the stream until we see whose tracers are getting
into the stream, and then we know 'okay, that's the septic field that
needs to be fixed.' We have already been approached by the town of
Ithaca to do this for some watersheds where they have some leaky septic
tanks*.

*It is not only going to revolutionize sort of the very applied problems
like finding pollution sources.* *I think scientist will be able to ask
new question about how water and material moves through the landscape --
that they haven't been able to ask because we did not have tools like
this to use. *

**Announcer**

On the next edition of Partners, it's *Fluid Planet* The importance of
water in 21^st^. Century is paramount. The problems facing America range
from water quality to water conservation. And as populations expand, the
pressures on this life-giving resource increases exponentially.
Land-grant universities are meeting the challenge of the *Fluid Planet
...* next time, on Partners.