Bio-nanomaterials
A rising amount of excited scientists has been produced due to the combination of nanoscale devices with biological molecules to promote applications in biotehnology, giving birth to Bionanotechnology.
One of our objectives as Research Center is the study of biopfysical properties that allow the structure development, growth, phase transitions and dynamics of organic films, and also the basis development of different biosensors.
Another focus on research is the study of bionanomaterials in the environment as source of human exposure and their relation. It has been identified that ourdoors and indoors with suspended particles with aerodynamic sizes of 2.5 micrometers and even smaller, have shown to have harmful consequences for humans' health, such as: Few respiratory symptoms, asthma, chronic obstructive lung disease which can increase premature deaths. In this regard, CIEN-UC tries to identify biological agents responsible for such harmful effects on humans' health in order to suggest strategies used to decrease environmental risks.
Biocompatible Nanomaterials
Multidisciplinary skills combination in the area of Nanotechnology have granted information to comprehend our world in a nanometric scale and with great impact on medical and biological sciences.
Bionanotechnology has been developed quickly and the number of nanostructures in biocompatible materials and biological sensors has grown considerably. This has allowed the emergence of new techniques for molecular diagnosis and disease treatment. Despite of this big progress, we haven not been able to thoroughly understand interactions between nanometric materials and biological compunds. Achieving this knowledge is essential to improve current measurements techniques and elaborate new applications.
Having this in mind, we want to apply, to problems of bilogical interest, appropriate techniques of physical sciences such as metrology based on optical spectroscopies and the development of new materials through plasma discharges.
CIEN-UC focuses its effort on two research areas: The first one tries to use diamond nanocrystals and alumina nanoporous membranes as the basis of cells and biomolecules detectors; the second one develops new biocompatible materials. Both reesearch areas include the study of nanostructures surface interaction with biomolecules and cell tissue, considering the surfaces functionalization for selective measurements og biological agents.
