Nanoscale
Department of Food Science, College of Agriculture & Life Sciences, Cornell University, 243 Stocking Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
Published: September 2017
Nano- and micromotors are machines designed to self-propel and-in the process of propelling themselves-perform specialized tasks like cleaning polluted waters. These motors offer distinct advantages over conventionally static decontamination methods, owing to their ability to move around and self-mix-which heightens the interaction between their active sites and target pollutants-thus improving their speed and efficiency, which could potentially decrease treatment times and costs. In the last decade, considerable research efforts have been expended on exploring various mechanisms by which these motors can self-propel and remove pollutants, proving that the removal of oil droplets, heavy metals, and organic compounds using these synthetic motors is possible. This review highlights recent progress in the design of these nano- and micromotors for cleaning polluted waters, and gives an overview of their structure, fabrication, and propulsion methods, with a special focus on the mechanisms by which they remove pollutants-namely, either by adsorption or by degradation. A fundamental understanding of these removal mechanisms, with their attendant advantages and disadvantages, can help researchers fine-tune motor design in the future so that technical issues can be resolved before they are scaled-up for a wide variety of environmental applications.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/c7nr05494g | DOI Listing |
ACS Nano
November 2024
College of Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen 518055, P. R. China.
Micro/nanorobots have shown great promise for minimally invasive bacterial infection therapy. However, bacterial infections usually form biofilms inside the body by aggregation and adhesion, preventing antibiotic penetration and increasing the likelihood of recurrence. Moreover, a substantial portion of the infection happens in those hard-to-access regions, making delivery of antibiotics to infected sites or tissues difficult and exacerbating the challenge of addressing bacterial infections.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFACS Nano
October 2024
State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, International School of Materials Science and Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, China.
Synthetic nano- and micromachines hold immense promise in biomedicine and environmental science. Currently, bubble-driven tubular micro/nanomotors have garnered increasing attention owing to their exceptional high-speed self-propulsions. However, complex and low-yield preparation methods have hindered their widespread applications.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNano Lett
October 2024
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Nanophotonic Manipulation, Institute of Nanophotonics, College of Physics & Optoelectronic Engineering, Jinan University, Guangzhou 511443, China.
The delivery of NO at a high spatiotemporal precision is important but still challenging for existing NO-releasing platforms due to the lack of precise motion control and limited biomedical functions. In this work, we propose an alternative strategy for developing the light-armed nitric oxide-releasing micromotor (LaNorM), in which a main light beam was employed to navigate the microparticle and stimulate NO release and an auxiliary light beam was used to cooperate with the released NO to act as a remotely controlled scalpel for cell separation. Benefiting from the advantages of fully controlled locomotion, photostimulated NO release, and microsurgery ability at the single-cell level, the proposed LaNorM could enable a series of biomedical applications , including the separation of flowing emboli, selective removal of a specific thrombus, and inhibition of thrombus growth, which may provide new insight into the precise delivery of NO and the treatment of cardiovascular diseases.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFColloids Surf B Biointerfaces
September 2024
Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Hacettepe University, Ankara 06800, Turkey. Electronic address:
Nano/micromotors hold immense potential for revolutionizing drug delivery and detection systems, especially in the realm of cancer diagnosis and treatment, owing to their distinctive features, including precise propulsion, maneuverability, and meticulously designed surface modifications. In this study, we explore the capabilities of modified and magnetically driven micromotors as active drug delivery systems within 2D and 3D cell culture environments and cancer diagnosis. We synthesized gold (Au) and iron-nickel (Fe-Ni) metallic-based magnetic micromotors (Au:Fe-Ni MMs) through electrochemical methods, equipping them with functionalities for controlled doxorubicin (DOX) release and cancer cell recognition.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnal Chim Acta
August 2024
Inner Mongolia Key Laboratory of Carbon Nanomaterials, Nano Innovation Institute (NII), College of Chemistry and Materials Science, Inner Mongolia Minzu University, Tongliao, 028000, China.
Background: Rapid on-site detection of infectious diseases is considerably essential for preventing and controlling major epidemics and maintaining social and public safety. However, the complexity of the natural environment in which infectious disease pathogens exist severely disrupts the performance of on-site detection, and rapid detection can become meaningless because of the cumbersome sample pretreatment process.
Result: Herein, a new detection platform based on a carbon sphere@FeO micromotor (CS@FeO) in combination with a graphene field-effect transistor (GFET) was designed and used for the on-site detection of SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus pathogens.
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