Key to the advances in the other projects in the "Organelle Research Laboratory" is the interdisciplinary effort that aims to develop and design new bioanalytical methods and bioinstrumentation. Some of the critical components to accomplish these aims are:

1. Explore the fundamental understanding of the behavior of subcellular-size particles and particle models (i.e. artificial vesicles and nanostructures) under various separation regimes. These regimes are based on electrophoretic and dielectrophoretic properties, molecular affinity, and particle size and are directed towards carrying out measurements at the single particle level.

2. Design and build microinstrumentation based on capillary electrophoresis, capillary affinity chromatography, and microfluidic devices that are not readily available.

3. Design chemically modified surfaces (i.e silane chemistries) that control the interactions between the device walls with particles and organelles.

4. Design detection strategies for high sensitivity detection based on chemical labels, biomolecule interactions, and genetic manipulation (i.e. GFP gene).

5. Explore novel strategies for organelle and particle separations based on properties such as surface chemistry, size, deformability, isoelectric point, or chemical interactions.

Participants