The NN group members would like to congratulate Laura González for her excellent work on the Ph.D. thesis defense!
Laura’s thesis is entitled “Evaluating inorganic nanoparticles in the living organism Caenorhabditis elegans” and has been supervised by Dr. Anna Laromaine and Dr. Anna Roig, from the NN group.
Prof. Joel N. Meyer will give a Seminar entitled “Mechanisms of uptake and toxicity of silver nanoparticles in Caenorhabditis elegans“, today, December 15, at 12 pm at ICMAB Conference Room Carles Miravitlles.
Engineered nanomaterials offer great opportunities due to their novel properties. However, there is concern that these novel properties may also result in deleterious effects on human and ecological health that are difficult to predict based only on an understanding of the chemical makeup. We tested a number of nanoparticles (NPs) for toxicity in the nematode model Caenorhabditis elegans, and found that certain silver NPs (AgNPs) were the most toxic of the NPs that we had tested. We therefore extended our studies to characterize environmental factors that might alter AgNP toxicity, as well as the uptake and mechanism of toxicity of AgNPs in C. elegans.
Because much AgNP waste is expected to end up in aquatic ecosystems, we tested the influence of environmental variables on toxicity. We found that higher ionic strength, the presence of natural organic matter, and sulfidation of the AgNPs (expected to occur in many environments after AgNP release) all significantly reduced Ag NP toxicity. Using physicochemical, genetic, and pharmacological rescue approaches, we found that the most toxic AgNPs -generally, the smallest- caused their effects largely via dissolution. Some AgNPs (typically less soluble due to size or coating) also caused toxicity via generation of reactive oxygen species, an effect specific to nanoparticulate silver. This effect was masked by the toxicity of silver ions except when dissolution was very limited. The toxicity of the tested AgNPs was almost never greater than would result from complete dissolution of the same mass of silver. We also found that endocytosis was an important mechanism for AgNP uptake. However, the specific mechanisms by which AgNPs or released silver ion cause toxicity remain unclear. Because AgNPs are used to kill microbes, and mitochondria are endosymbiotic descendants of bacteria, current studies are focused on testing the possibility that AgNPs cause some of their toxicity via disruption of mitochondrial function.
If you would like to arrange a meeting with Prof. Joel N. Meyer please contact: Dr. Anna Laromaine(alaromaine@icmab.es).
Anna Laromaineappears in the MUY INTERESANTE magazine number 427 (December 2016). The magazine article highlights Anna’s carrer: from studying Chemistry at Universitat de Girona, to her PhD at ICMAB, and her multiple Postdoctoral Fellowships at University College London, MIT and Harvard, where she worked in different fields related to nanomaterials and biomedicine, before returning to ICMAB.
The article also emphasizes the fact that Anna is not only a prolific researcher; she also teaches at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, gives seminars and talks in high schools, and has founded her own startup company.
We hope you enjoy the article and learn a little bit more of one of our group members! Congratulations Anna!
This morning, November 17th, at 9.30 am there is a session of “Spin-Offs. From Lab to Market”, within the Training Program FUNMAT (Severo-Ochoa Seminars), dedicated to all researchers and PhD candidates of the Institute.
Some members of the N&N group have attented the seminar. It is always good to know what your colleagues are working on and to have information about patents and spin-offs creation. In our group, Anna Laromaine is cofounder of the spin-off OsmoBlue, which aim is to produce electricity from low-temperature heat.
The program of the seminar is the following:
Why a spin-off ? PRUAB (Parc de Recerca UAB) activities in business creation. Presentation of cases and experiences.
Speaker: Julia Palma (PRUAB).
Synergism between Nanomol research group and Nanomol technologies
Speakers: Nora Ventosa and Santi Sala (Nanomol, ICMAB).
Presentation of Oxolutia. Oxolutia path and “lessons learned”.
Speaker: Albert Calleja (Oxolutia, ICMAB).
Roundtable with some researchers involved in spin-offs creation and other experiences
Jan Grzelak obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Nanostructure Engineering at theUniversity of Warsaw (Poland). Then he started studying the Master program at the same university, also in Nanostructure Engineering. Now he is doing his second and last year of Master with an Erasmus program at the UAB, on Advanced Nanoscience and Nanotechnology.
Jan will join our N&N group atICMAB, and will be supervised by Martí Gich and Anna Laromaine. He will be working on alumina tubes with palladium nanoparticles, using bacterial cellulose as a template for the synthesis.
Follow-up meeting after seven months of starting the E-BCN project (Engineering Bacterial Cellulose Nanocomposites).
Two PhD students, Soledad Roigand Irene Anton, will be added to the project team. Soledad will work in structuring and patterning bacterial cellulose, and Irene in applying bacterial cellulose nanocomposites for skin regenaration.
Participants of the project include: Anna Roig, Dino Tonti, Jordi Faraudo, Anna Laromaine, Martí Gich, Anna May, Soledad Roig and Irene Anton.
New Ph.D. Students: Ma, Irene, Sole, Yajie and Luo.
Today during the Group Meeting we welcomed the 5 new Ph.D. students that will start their Ph.D. thesis in the N&N Group! We hope you enjoy your stay with us!
Ma Zheng: BSc. Electronic Information Science and Technology at Taishan University (Taian, China) and MSc. Condensed Matter Physics at University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (UESTC, Chengdu, China). His Ph.D. thesis topic will be “Physics of ε-Fe2O3” supervised by Martí Gich.
Irene Anton: BSc.Biotechnology at Universitat de Barcelona and MSc. Biomedical Research at Universitat Pompeu Fabra. She will work on “Functionalized bacterial cellulose for skin tissue regeneration” with Anna Roig and Anna Laromaine.
Soledad Roig: BSc. Chemistry at Universidad de Valencia and MSc. Nanoscience, Materials and Processes at Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Research work at Northeastern University, USA). During her Ph.D. she will work on “Engineering bacterial cellulose nanocomposites” with Anna Roig and Anna Laromaine.
Yajie Zhang: BSc. Applied Chemistry at the Institute of Surface Micro and Nanomaerials at Xuchuang University (China) and MSc. Applied Chemistry in the Key Laboratory Marine Chemistry and Technology, at Ocean University of China, and will work on “Nanocapsules as drug delivery carriers for pro-angiogenic therapies” with Anna Roig and Anna Rosell (Vall d’Hebron Research Institute (VHIR)).
Zhongrui Luo: BSc. Bioengineering at Nanjing Agricultural University (China) and MSc. Applied Chemistry at Yunnan University (China). His Ph.D. research will be on “Assessment of nanoparticles toxicity using C. elegans as model organism”, with Anna Laromaine.
Anna Laromaine is one of the five scientific women granted by L’Oréal in the iniciative “For Women in Science” #Ponlescara, to visualize scientific women in various disciplines and bring them close to society and to students.
During the day, the five scientific women, with other three more, have answered the questions of more than 100 highschool students. The idea is to see that women are in all the scientific areas, and that the scientific career is a possibility to consider.
The five scientific women have received 15.000 € to spend in Research Projects in their scientific areas within the XI Edition of the “Bolsas de Investigación 2016” program. Apart from Anna Laromaine, the other granted women are Vanesa Esteban, Azucena Bardaji, Jaione Valle and Anna Shnyrova. The ceremony took place in Madrid, with Cristina Cifuentes, president of the Comunidad de Madrid, and Carmen Vela, secretaria de Estado in Research, Development and Innovation.
CosmoCaixa Barcelona hosts on September 27th and 28th a meeting of international researchers in basic and applied plant research focused on the development of new sustainable materials: “Plant proteostasis: towards a green based industry”.
Jordi Floriach, student from the Nanoscience and Nanotechnology degree at UAB and intern in our group under the supervison of Anna Laromaine, is attending this meeting, whose scientific leaders areL. Maria Lois and Núria Sànchez Coll, from CRAGand collaborators of the N&N Group.
The purpose of these debates is to bring together multidisciplinary biotechnology experts to create synergies that would facilitate the transition from a fossil-dependent economy to a sustainable bioeconomy, but also to gain acceptance and support from the general public to carry out this transition.
The NN group members would like to congratulate Laura González for her excellent work on the Ph.D. thesis defense!
