Uses of Nanotechnology

Have you ever drove home from work, having a feeling you were forgetting to do something important? It’s 7 o’clock in the evening, you just realized that you were supposed to pay a bill before the bank closed. The money is there in the account but, how is the bank supposed to receive it? Well, luckily you pull out an iphone 6 to transfer the money into the account to pay the bill by using e-banking. Simple as that, you go home with a clear conscience knowing only that your bill is paid. Of course, people only care for the end results of a situation, but it’s sometimes good to consider what goes on in the transition. Crucial data such as financial record and pin number need to be under tight security. Only highly advanced technology that was

For many years the identification of microorganisms has been important in the world of medicine. It is essential or correct disease diagnosis in patients and for proper treatment. Knowing the correct identity and characteristics of microorganism is crucial when disease outbreaks occur in populations, also knowing how humans can benefit from microorganisms is important; many can be used in making certain foods or antibiotics.

This is important in the medical field because identification of unknown bacteria can help treat a patient by knowing the contributing source of a disease. Also knowledge of different bacteria helped others make antibiotics used today. This lab was completed by using the methods learned thus far in identification of bacteria.

The identification of unknown organisms carries important ramifications that can be applied to many real world scenarios. In keeping with quality assurance beverages, food, cosmetics, and other products are frequently inspected for contaminants resulting from a presence of pathogenic bacteria. In medicine, a physician’s diagnosis and consequent treatment is largely determined from samples collected from infection sites that have been analyzed using microbial tests.

Different microbes can transmit and produce different types of diseases and infections. Having an unknown bacterium in the body can be a life and death situation. It is very important especially in the healthcare industry that providers are able to differentiate between organisms that are pathogenic and administer the appropriate treatment to their patients. Applying methods that were previously studied in lab, students must be able to isolate an unknown specimen by using laboratory techniques and biochemical tests.

The identification of bacteria is important in studies related to diseases. Identifying how bacteria responds to certain biochemical tests can give the experimenter valuable information such as the metabolic activity and morphology of an unknown bacteria. With this information, the scientific community can identify a bacterium and respond appropriately to disease outbreaks This information also helps doctors provide the appropriate diagnosis for patients afflicted with a bacterial disease.

In our world we are surrounded by microorganisms, some are harmless, many are beneficial; they are a part of our normal flora on our skin and in our intestines, providing a barrier against microorganisms that may not be so harmless. It is important, however, to distinguish which microorganisms are potentially pathogenic from those that are not, and when someone does get ill to determine what the organism is so appropriate treatment can be determined.

Real time RT-PCR and other molecular tests can also be an effective diagnostic tools. The molecular tests detect viral genetic material in respiratory system with swab samples collected from the throat and nasal cavity to correctly identify the infection.

5 The test microscope slide was composed of a drop of B. subtilis solution placed on the left as the Gram-positive control, a drop of a solution with unknown in the middle, and a drop of E. coli solution on the right as a Gram-negative control. The slide was allowed to dry and the samples were heat fixed with a Bunsen burner. The samples were then stained with first crystal violet for one minute. After the rinsing the stain, the mordant, Gram’s iodine, was added for one minute and rinsed. A 95% ethyl alcohol/acetone solution was then applied and rinsed to de-stain the samples. Finally, Saffranin was added as the counterstain for one minute and then rinsed. Bright field microscopy, using 1000X magnification and oil immersion, was conducted to visualize first the controls, and if those results were accurate, the unknown. The three samples were observed for stain color to determine Gram classification, as well as shape and arrangement to further classify the

(top right) labeled plate lacked bacterial cells with plasmid DNA, but contained the antibiotic ampicillin. There was no bacterial cell growth observed in this plate. Agar plate (bottom left) labeled “+DNA/+AMP” contained “competent” bacterial cells, as well as ampicillin. For this plate there was localized bacterial cell growth with minimal color observed. The “+DNA/+AMP/+IPTG” (bottom right) plate contained “competent” bacterial cells, ampicillin, and isopropyl-β-D-thiogalactopyranoside (IPTG). Bacterial cell growth was present,

Nanoparticles (1 000 000 times smaller than a millimetre) are manifesting to be a great success in nanomedicine’s discovery of supplementary methods of fighting against superbugs. At the University of Colorado, researchers have utilized nanoscale quantum dots, which are “miniscule semiconductor particles with specific light-absorption properties, to kill drug-resistant superbugs without harming the surrounding healthy tissue,” (Nagpal, 2017: para. 2). Nanoscale quantum dots that are activated by a light source perturb the balance of chemical processes in threatening bacteria that would kill them.

In order to identify possible diagnostic targets, I will take advantage of the in vivo Microbial Antigen Discovery (InMAD) approach23. This methodology, especially useful vis-à-vis of pathogens that are present in very small quantities in the blood, is based on the immunization of mice using filtered serum from infected animals, in order to promote an immune response against circulating microbial antigens, but not against cell-related antigens. Then, the immunized sera are tested against bacterial lysates in 2D-western blots and positive spots are identified by mass spectrometry as potential diagnostic candidates.

Thiol-capped QDs are highly biocompatible and fluorescent. The thiol-capped QDs have been used for the detection of biomolecules. The thiols capped (GHS) are stable in a living cell for weeks.

Many important scientists contributed to the development of the microscope, however, perhaps the most influential is Anton van Leeuwenhoek. Known as the father of microbiology, Van Leeuwenhoek was the first to discover bacteria through the use of microscopes that he developed himself (2, 3). Since then, many more scientists have made other changes leading to even more advancements in microscopy. Some of the microscopes most commonly used in microbiology include bright field, dark-field, phase-contrast, fluorescence, and differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy (1). For this particular report, bright-field microscopes are used to visualize the unknown bacteria. Microorganisms are able to be viewed using the contrast of the microbe against the bright background of the slide (1). Sometimes it can be difficult to view microbes against a light background because they will seem transparent or have little contrast. To increase the contrast and allow for easier viewing, microbes are often stained. A condenser allows visible light to be focused and create a contrast between the background and the specimen. The microscope contains 4x, 10x, 40x, and 100x objective lenses. The 4x and 10x are used in order to scan the slide and determine the general location of the stained bacteria while the higher magnification lenses are

One of these factors is pyocyanin (PYO), the blue nitrogen-containing compound in the family of phenazine compounds.10-12 It is exclusively secreted as a secondary metabolite by Pseudomonas aeruginosa during their growth, which makes this molecule a great diagnostic marker for identifying infections.13 PYO has been isolated from the sputum of infected patients with concentrations ranging from 1 – 130 µM, from human ear secretions with concentrations up to 2.7 µM, and from wounds with concentrations up to 8.1 µM.14-16 This compound is responsible for generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) that initiate inflammation of the host tissue.10 Studies have shown that PYO causes oxidative stress to cells, stimulates neutrophil apoptosis, and reduces the beating of lung cilia, thus allowing bacterial infections to flourish.17-19 PYO is also involved in quorum sensing (QS), a cell-to-cell communication process allowing bacteria to regulate gene expression based on the effective cell density.13,20 Therefore, detecting and quantifying PYO could potentially provide a better understanding of Pseudomonas aeruginosa’s pathway to infections. As it is a redox-active molecule that undergoes a reversible two-electron redox process, PYO can be sensed