PFI-TT: Interferometric Imaging for Multiplexed Molecular Kinetics

Award ID: 1941195

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Partnerships for Innovation - Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project is to advance the current state-of-the-art biological detection technologies. Both in vitro diagnostics and the pharmaceutical industry rely on biotechnology tools to discover and develop new molecular interactions. Since all biological pathways rely on protein-DNA and protein-protein interactions, not only is accurate characterization of these interactions crucial, but they are prime targets for disruption with small molecules in disease treatment. Emerging diseases call for new diagnostic tests and thus new molecular discoveries. This Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project will pave the way to commercialization of a new technology based on light interference. There will be a direct societal impact by enabling better diagnostics and therapeutics. In addition, we will train several women engineering PhD students in technology development and entrepreneurship. The proposed project builds on innovations in Interferometric reflectance imaging sensor (IRIS) technology. The underlying measurement principle is based on the interference of light reflected from an optically transparent thin filmthe same phenomenon that gives rainbow colors to a soap film when illuminated by white light. The proposed innovation uses a different approach than the conventional method of enhancing the signal through complex optical resonances; instead, we exploit the power of signal averaging to achieve very high sensitivity in a simple instrument platform. By design, the IRIS technique is resilient to the background signal due to variations in the solution (termed bulk effect). The proposed new technique will further improve the ability to distinguish molecular binding on the surface from the variations in the bulk solution. The proposed IRIS platform is unique among all label-free optical biosensors with multiplexed detection of molecular binding kinetics on Si microfludic chips as low-cost consumables. Hundreds of capture probes can be arrayed on the IRIS chip and tested against a target molecule in parallel. The expected low cost of the instrument will allow for integration of parallel sensors to achieve high throughput and multiplexing simultaneously. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

NSF Program Director: Samir Iqbal