SBIR Phase II: Immunological Tools for Trimetasphere Fullerenes

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II research develops antibodies and immunoassays for studying therapeutics based on carbon-based nanomaterials. This research will expand the immunological tools developed in Phase I to focus on detailed characterization of anti-fullerene antibodies and validate and down-select immunoassays and reagents for validated commercial formats. Commercial formats will include enzyme-linked, immunosorbant assays (ELISAs) for medical and environmental applications, neutralization schemes for mitigating potential toxicity of fullerene/nanotubes and biosensors platform for long-term monitoring systems. Biosensor platforms based on fullerene antibodies as affinity ligands will include the quartz crystal microbalance and surface acoustic waveguide. The broader impacts will be to provide a full spectrum of immunological tools for studying the medically-related nanomaterials and monitoring nanowaste by-products during manufacturing processes. These will be new to the marketplace and enable monitoring of the use of products based on these nanomaterials to asssure their safe application.