April Monthly Meeting

MONTHLY MEETING FLYER

5:30 PM Technology Forum: Power Center Ballroom
5:30 PM Social Hour: Power Center Ballroom
6:30 PM Dinner: Power Center Ballroom
7:45 PM Business Meeting: Power Center Ballroom
8:00 PM Technical Program: Power Center Ballroom
Student Affiliate Meeting: Shepperson Suite

SSP TECHNOLOGY FORUM

Paul Glass, PhD, VP Engineering nanoGriptech, Inc.

“Novel Applications of Mass Spectrometry to Atmospheric Chemistry”
Geckos’ ability to climb up walls and across ceilings is due to their millions of micro/nano foot-hairs, which interact through intermolecular attractions at the interface between these hairs and an underlying substrate, and not through tacky or oily secretions. Culminating in ten years of research, nanoGriptech has developed proprietary methods to produce glue-free, reusable, synthetic gecko-inspired microfiber adhesives for a wide range of applications. These materials can be integrated into products with excellent adhesive, fastening, or gripping properties due to their ability to repeatedly and reversibly attach to a wide range of surfaces with high and controllable strength while leaving no residue. In this lecture, the principals of adhesion of different biological systems will be described, as well as methods of manufacture of synthetic biomaterials and pathways toward commercialization of these systems.

SACP TECHNICAL PROGRAM

Robbyn Anand, Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry at Iowa State University

“Direct Detection of Inflammatory Markers in Tear Fluid in a Paper Strip by Electrochemical ELISA Following Electrokinetic Pre-Enrichment”
Sjögren’s syndrome (SS) is a connective tissue disease that primarily impacts the exocrine glands (esp. lacrimal (tear) and salivary glands). This autoimmune disease may also have extraglandular involvement that leads to excessive fatigue and carries the potential for organ damage. Dryness resulting from damage to moisture producing glands can be quantified in the clinic via the assessment of the production rate of tears or saliva. However, diagnosis depends on the positive identification of an underlying inflammatory cause indicated by the presence of autoantibodies in the blood or foci of leukocyte infiltrates in biopsied salivary tissue. Due to a high false negative rate for these tests and a lack of physician awareness of this condition, the average time to diagnosis is 6 years. The concentration of inflammatory proteins in tear fluid may provide an independent indication of autoimmune etiology, and therefore, the analysis of this fluid has the potential to decrease the difficulty of diagnosis. Our research seeks to integrate electrochemical ELISA with an additional electrokinetic preenrichment in a paper strip to provide sufficient signal enhancement to reach a relevant limit of quantitation for the assessment of inflammatory proteins in tears. Enrichment will be achieved by ion concentration polarization, with an expected 10- to 100-fold enhancement. We present initial progress towards this goal – namely, the electrochemical detection of an enriched analyte in a paper-based device.

MONTHLY MEETING FLYER