Project Title: Active nanoparticles in blood flow: nanomotor kinetics and design

Project Mentors:

• Primary Faculty Mentor (Name, Affiliation, website, and Email/Phone):

Xianqiao Wang, School of Environmental, Civil, Agricultural and Mechanical Engineering, http://xqwang.engr.uga.edu, 706-542-6251, xqwang@uga.edu

• Secondary Faculty Mentor (Name, Affiliation, website, and Email/Phone):

Yiping Zhao, Department of Physics and Astronomy, http://www.physast.uga.edu/~zhaoy/706-542-7792, zhaoy@physast.uga.edu

• Graduate Student mentor (Name, Affiliation, and Email/Phone):

Matthew Becton, School of Environmental, Civil, Agricultural and Mechanical Engineering, Computational Nano/Bio-Mechanics Lab under Dr. Wang, 912-656-0209,becton@uga.edu

• Graduate Student mentor (Name, Affiliation, and Email/Phone):

Zhizhe Hu, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Zizhe.Hu@uga.edu; He will provide experimental related data for simulation.

Project Description:Active nanoparticles such as nanomotors exhibit markedly different behaviors compared with passive nanoparticles, and can be used for drug transport and even blood flow enhancement. This project aims to: (1) develop a multifaceted computational model which is able to accurately simulate the movement of nanomotors within blood flow; (2) design tunable parameters allowing for replication of various types of flow within the body such as artery, microcapillary, and blood clot-blocked channels; and (3) use experimental data to calibrate the simulations in order to mimic previously developed nanomotors and determine important physical factors for future nanomotor design.

REU Student Role and Responsibility:The REU student will work with two faculty members and a graduate student to: (1) further develop an existing analytical model and create a newly-developed computational model of magnetic nanoparticle transport in order to model the timely and spatially varying concentration of nanoparticles; (2) develop experimental techniques (with the mentors) that can measure predicted concentrations in a microfluidic system; (3) analyze experimental data and the potential discrepancy between models and experiments; (4) present results on a weekly basis to the research group; (5) submit an abstract to BMES annual meeting (Atlanta GA); (6) contribute to potential journal publications.

Required skills or courses for the REU student:Ideally, the student should have a strong physics/engineering background and have taken courses including electromagnetism, ordinary differential equation, finite element methods. The student should have experiences in working with MATLAB for modeling and simulation. Previous experience in nanomaterials is beneficial but not required.

Expected Outcome for REU student:The student will submit an abstract to BMES annual meeting, and co-author journal publications if the project is successful.