Proposals Awarded
Collaborative UTD - UTA Presidential Joint Institutional Seed Research Program
Understanding Trim2 and Its Role in Neurodegeneration
Principal Investigators
Santosh D'Mello (UTD), Andre Pires da Silva (UTA)
Project Summary
Neurological diseases disrupt the quality of life for patients, puts a tremendous burden on family caregivers, and cost society billions of dollars annually. Increasing numbers of elderly people in the population has resulted in a sharp increase in the prevalence of neurological diseases. Underlying a majority of these diseases is the abnormal degeneration of neurons. While symptomatic treatments are available for many neurological diseases, a cure is not presently available.
Identifying molecules within a neuron that are important for the survival of neurons and understanding the mechanism by which they act would lead to the development of more effective therapeutic strategies. Research performed by the leading investigator of this proposal has led to the finding that in mice, the deletion of a single protein called Trim2 leads to degeneration of neurons in a part of the brain called the cerebellum, without affecting other brain regions. This mutant mouse represents an excellent model to study the role of Trim2 in neuronal survival and why its absence affects some brain regions selectively.
Selective degeneration of neurons is a common feature of most neurodegenerative disease including Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease. This collaboration brings together a highly talented molecular and developmental biologist and a seasoned researcher with extensive experience in the field of neurodegeneration. The specific goals of the proposal is to understand when during brain development is the Trim2 protein produced and where within a cell does this protein reside.
We will also study what happens to neurons cultured from two different brain regions when Trim2 production is forcibly suppressed using molecular biological techniques. We believe that the findings from this collaborative project will lay the groundwork for funding from federal granting sources such as the National Institutes of Health and private foundations such as the March of Dime foundation.
Functions of Histone Variants on Germ Cell Transcription
Principal Investigators
Jeff De Jong (UTD), Subhrangsu Mandal (UTA)
Project Summary
All higher forms of life need to produce germ cells, or gametes, for reproduction. Studies indicate that germ cells contain unusual DNA packaging systems (chromatin) compared to normal somatic cells. Presumably, germ cell chromatin is programmed with specific histone protein isoforms along with new types of post-transcriptional histone modifications. Herein, we propose to study the functions of germ cell histone isoforms on transcription and to identify novel transcription factors involved in germ cell-specific gene regulation.
In the future we will extend these studies to analyze post-translational histone modifications on histone isoforms in order to elucidate a germ cell specific "histone code". These studies will reveal gene regulatory pathways that exist in germ cells and will help to unfold mysteries surrounding biochemical and genetic disorders including cancer and heritable genetic diseases.
Low-Cost RF Components for Reconfigurable Wireless Sensors
Principal Investigators
Jin Liu (UTD), J. C. Chiao (UTA)
Project Summary
The University of Texas at Dallas and The University of Texas at Arlington collaboratively propose developing technologies to build reconfigurable high-frequency components suitable for wafer-scale fabrication and sensor system integration. The proposed research responds to the urgent homeland security needs for complete system-level integration of wireless sensor systems with low manufacturing costs and required high performance.
To be specific, we propose to build low-cost RF structures, such as filters and waveguides, by industrial semiconductor, plastic molding and electroplating processes, to integrate with high- speed integrated circuits. The plastic-based RF device architecture will provide advantages of low insertion losses, low series resistance and high quality factors to realize high sensitivity sensor systems or low-cost RFID sensors.
The scientific and scholarly merit is to enable a new generation of RF components based on a common integration platform for robust, cost-effective, reliable, portable wireless sensors. The research involves electromagnetic wave propagation and modeling, high-frequency circuitry design and fabrication, RF CMOS ICs, materials, RF characterization, sensor integration and electrochemistry. The devices generated in this project can also be applied in broadband wireless communications, high-speed electronics, biomedical diagnosis, environmental monitoring and robotics.
Emergency Beacon for First Responder Radios
Principal Investigators
Mohammad Saquib (UTD), Qilian Liang (UTA)
Project Summary
The recent emergency scenario, the West Virginia Sago mine disaster in January 2006, has reminded the necessity of improving radio links for first responders in difficult reception environments for rescue.
The weakest link in the first-responder's communication system is the transmission power of a portable handset. Even when the base station is able to transmit powerful and intelligible signals to a first responder, the first responder is often unable to complete the communication link with the reduced power available in his or her handset, typically 1 to 5 watts. The radio signals emanating from the first-responder's portable handset, after being attenuated by structural materials, become so weak that they become indistinguishable from electrical noise from other sources.
Using the techniques developed in this research project, it will be possible to detect simple codes, consisting of only a few well-defined symbols, from a portable handset even when attenuation is high enough to make voice communication impossible. In this work, we propose to use Space-Time-Frequency Modulation and Coding with time-hopping ultra-wideband technology (TH-UWB) for the first responder radio, and we also propose to investigate its medium access control (MAC) layer design.
This research can further be developed for commercializing and integrating the beacons into communication systems for first responders. We will demonstrate successful reception of information at least 50 dB below the noise floor of standard first responder handset radios. Due to the timeliness, uniqueness and the practical importance of this proposal, it will have significant potential to attract external funding from different federal agencies, such as NSF, ARO, ONR, DARPA, and NIST, etc. The research activities in this proposal will attract strong interest from telecommunications companies with R & D facilities in the Dallas area.
This research project will link the telecommunications corridor in Dallas with the Electrical Engineering Departments of UTA and UTD and will generate intellectual property for both the institutions.
Exploration of New Barrier Materials for Future Generation Microelectronic Devices
Principal Investigators
Jiyoung Kim (UTD), C. -U Kim (UTA)
Project Summary
This exploratory research aims to develop new barrier materials ideal for future microelectronic devices. The key to the success of the future microelectronics lies on the successful miniaturization of the interconnect structure without sacrificing its structural complexity and reliability.
While various technological challenges exist ahead for such an ambitious goal, the most critical is considered to be the reliable integration of the barrier layer into the interconnect structure. The reliability of the barrier layer is critical because it protects the circuit by preventing Cu from migrating into insulating layer, but will need to maintain this protection with only a few nanometer thickness. The layer has to be defect-free from the beginning and maintain its stability during various punishing thermal and chemical processes. In order to enable a barrier with such a seemingly impossible capabilities, new materials must be selected and related processes must be developed. However, the progress has been agonizingly slow field, primarily because it requires extensive iteration of the material sets, process conditions, and characterizations.
The research team at U. T. Arlington (UTA) has been in the forefront of the barrier technology research and has developed a new characterization metrology especially effective for ultrathin barrier. On the other hand, the research team at U. T. Dallas (UTD) has been working on a new thin processing method, ALD (atomic layer deposition), which is under vigorous pursuit in the microelectronics industry.
Therefore, it is more than desired to form a collaborative research team by combining the expertise of each and to attack the research with specific goals of 1) developing ideal barrier materials with the desired properties and process conditions, and 2) developing effective test metrologies for the identified materials. Currently, two candidates are chosen as the research focus, and they are ALD grown Ruthenium (Ru) and TaN. Ultrathin films of these materials will be prepared at UTD with variation of preparation conditions, and their characteristics, particularly the nature and density of defects and their evolution with subsequent processing, will be characterized at UTA.
The impact of the research outcome will be substantial to the microelectronics industry, not to mention to general thin film science, and will open numerous funding opportunities from several agencies and companies.
Human Powered Wireless Sensor Network
Principal Investigators
Hoi Lee (UTD), Shashank Priya (UTA)
Project Summary
Wireless sensor networks occupy wide spectrum of applications and have led to significant advances in remote sensing and communication. The advancement in the CMOS-technology, IC manufacturing, and networking techniques utilizing Bluetooth communication have brought down the total power requirements of wireless sensor node to well below 1mW.
At this juncture it is possible to fabricate sensor nodes that can be powered by scavenging the energy from freely available environmental resources such as vibrations, wind, temperature gradient, light, and sound. Realization of such sensor nodes will lead to development of the "self-powered" sensor networks eliminating the expensive and tedious maintenance operation such as replacement of batteries and dramatically enhancing the life time of the network. One of the critical sensor networks in the modern times is being developed for monitoring the security of the citizens in public places from chemical and biological warfare agents. This network consists of chemical and gas detectors, explosive detectors, or biological hazard detectors.
The major challenge in the implementation of public security network is deployment of sensors and supplying the power to the sensors. For example – it is difficult to spread the gas sensors on the busy and crowded street. This research program provides a unique solution to this problem by developing a human powered sensor network.
In the proposed architecture, each human acts as the sensor node. The sensors are embedded in the wrist watch and are powered by scavenging energy from the human arm motion using micro piezoelectric transducer. The focus in this program will be on developing a 7 x 10 x 1 mm3 size "power unit" which can be attached at the bottom of the wrist watch. This unit consists of a cantilever structure piezoelectric transducer, energy scavenging circuit, storage media, switches and wireless transmission unit.
The proposed collaborative research has huge implications for the homeland security. The results of this research will be of significant interest to National Science Foundation in their program on human powered computing, and office of naval research in their program on counter improvised explosive devices. The team proposing this research consists of Dr. Shashank Priya who has expertise on the piezoelectric devices and Dr. Hoi Lee who is well-known for his research on mixed-signal integrated circuits for power management.
UTD and UTA Collaborative Research Commercialization Strategy
Principal Investigators
Joseph Picken, David Deeds, Robert Robb (UTD), Cynthia Kalina-Kaminsky (UTA)
Project Summary
Great technical innovations do not move successfully from the lab into the market without credible business strategy and management. The UTD and UTA Entrepreneurship Programs hold the keys to credibility for UTD-UTA researchers who wish to engage in commercialization activities for their research.
We are proposing funding for teams of UTD and UTA Entrepreneurship Program students to provide initial business analysis into eight UTD/UTA joint research opportunities. The grant will fund the development of collaborative commercialization processes and procedures and a pilot program of inter-university, student led research teams. It is expected that within one year, the entrepreneur research performed by the student teams will be used for joint UTD and UTA ETF grant proposals to the State of Texas, SBIR, or other funding entity. Long-term, the processes developed under this proposal have the potential to assist UTD and UTA in fulfilling state and federal mandates that are aimed at more effective commercialization of valuable technologies.
These technologies, which are the results of university research efforts, have been sponsored by state and federal tax dollars. The expected return on investment of the public's tax dollars will help in strengthening local, state and federal economies.
Understanding Vasular Endothelial Activation in Sickle Cell Anemia
Principal Investigators
Steven Goodman (UTD), Kytai Nguyen (UTA)
Project Summary
Sickle cell disease (SCD), a genetic disorder of red blood cells (RBCs), is characterized by chronic hemolysis and frequent painful episodes. The basis pathological factor in SCD is the recurrent occlusions of blood vessels. Most recent observations suggest that the vaso-occlusive process is a complex process that results from the interactions between sickle RBC, other blood components such as leukocytes (white blood cells) and plasma, and vascular endothelial cells (EC).
The interactions of blood components with EC cause changes in EC expression of various genes and proteins leading to EC activation and association of RBCs and WBCs. Although alterations in EC activation play an important role in the frequency of vaso-occlusion, only a few studies have investigated these changes under physiological flow conditions, which more closely resemble those in sickle cell patients. The long-tem goal of this proposal is, therefore, to explore differences in EC activation between two groups of patients - >3 and <1 sickle cell crises/year (these groups represent severe and mild clinical versions of SCD respectively) - using the in vitro bioreactor that mimics physiological flow conditions and modern technologies such mass spectrometry for proteomics.
Our central hypothesis is that the involvement of EC activation in the frequency of vasoocclusion is modulated by the changes in certain biomarkers, especially cell adhesion molecules (CAM). To test our hypothesis, the two following specific aims will be performed: 1. Develop an in vitro bioreactor and use this system to circulate sickle blood components past cultured vascular EC (by Dr. Nguyen's group). 2. Investigate the differences in protein profiles of EC exposed to circulating sickle blood components in order to identify biomarkers that can be used as classifiers to distinguish these two patient groups (by Dr. Goodman's group).
This is a highly collaborative project that involves the necessary expertise of the faculty in both campuses, UTD and UTA, to complete: Dr. Nguyen at UTA with expertise in bioengineering and research experience in the endothelium and in vitro flow systems and Dr. Goodman at UTD with expertise in proteomics and research experience in sickle cell anemia. The novel aspect of this proposal is the investigation of sickle blood components interaction with vascular endothelium under physiological flow conditions. We will use modern proteomic technologies for identifying EC protein changes that lead to differences in SCD pain severity. The outcome of this study will enhance our understanding of the molecular mechanisms involved in EC activation by sickle blood components. We will identify potential targets for sickle clinical diagnosis and therapy.
Evolving New Cancer Therapeutics Based on RGD-Integrin Cellular Interactions
Principal Investigators
Jung-Mo Ahn (UTD), Kevin Schug (UTA)
Project Summary
Integrins are a series of cell-surface proteins which mediate a variety of cellular processes, such as migration, differentiation, signaling, and death. Integrins in cancerous cells have been identified as major cancer therapy targets due to their role in the spread of metastic colonies and resistance to normal cell death signals. All of these processes are controlled through interaction by integrins with proteins present in the extracellular matrix (ECM) surrounding the cell.
The putative amino acid motif for recognition of integrins by ECM proteins is the arginine-glycine-aspartate (RGD) sequence. Therefore, focus has been placed on the use of this motif in the development of new cancer therapeutics for inhibiting integrin interactions which are defective to normal cell life. Our work proposes to synthesize and evaluate new peptide variants based from previously reported peptide sequences.
Solid-phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) will be used to vary the acidic and basic sites in the RGD peptide templates to create a series of new peptide-based cancer therapeutics. Electrostatic and hydrogenbonding interactions will be maximized through the inclusion of extended guanidine, phosphate, and sulfonate residues. Mass spectrometric titration and competitive binding studies will be used to evaluate the binding (affinity and selectivity) of our new peptides with: a) synthesized integrin peptide segments representative of the RGD binding domain; and b) intact integrin proteins.
Results of mass spectrometric measurements will be correlated with data from other spectroscopic techniques, as well as with data previously published in the literature. This research features a strong synergism between a synthetic (Dr. Ahn) and an analytical (Dr. Schug) chemist. Furthermore, the aims of the proposal are consistent with the expertise of both investigators. Funding of this work will provide the necessary materials for carrying out this research, as well as the necessary preliminary proof-of-principle measurements needed for soliciting further funding. The scope of this research is amenable to extensive further investigations and will be applicable for support by federal agencies, such as the National Institute of Health, the American Cancer Society, and the National Science Foundation.
Toward Forensic Reconstruction of Hydrology For Recent Rivers: Refining Methodology for Constraint of Paleochannel Dimensions
Principal Investigators
John Ferguson, George McMechan (UTD), John Holbrook (UTA)
Project Summary
The key to understanding future climate change lies in understanding past climate change. Models designed to predict how the Earth will respond to future natural, and possible human-induced, climate changes are bolstered by paleoclimate values (e.g., temperature, runoff, rainfall, wind speed, etc.) gleaned from the sedimentary record. One critical piece of this puzzle is the amount of past rainfall and river runoff. These critical aspects of the moisture budget are preserved in old abandoned river channels on modern river floodplains. Teasing the paleodischarge from these once active channels is an important method for gaining past rainfall and runoff data.
This science is refereed to as paleohydrology, and is an actively funded research priority of the NSF and DOE among other agencies and foundations. We wish to unite skills at UTD and UTA in order to form an effective paleohydrology research group. The skills to identify paleo river channels and estimate their flow exists at UTA. These estimates, however, depend upon accurate measurements of paleochannel cross-sectional dimensions. The geophysics group at UTD has researched techniques which could improve the accuracy of field measurements for these channels markedly. We wish to field-test these techniques to confirm that they will yield the results we predict. If these techniques live up to their promise, we could improve our paleohydrologic estimates by as much as an order of magnitude, which would prove to be a great advantage in future proposals.
First, however, we must refine these techniques, and demonstrate their utility. To do this we must attempt this technique in the field. The site we have chosen for this field test is the Missouri River floodplain. We already have discussed a proposal we intend to submit for study of this field site with the NSF Program Directors of Sedimentology and Geomorphology.
Submission of this planned proposal is contingent upon the success of the currently proposed study. We need to apply the test at the Missouri field site for this reason. Also, for efficiency sake, we need to use this field site because we must test the technique in an area which is well mapped, and with which we are already very familiar. Both are true of the Missouri site.
Aspects of Prosody as Used in Chinese and English
Principal Investigators
Yang Liu (UTD), Jerold A. Edmondson (UTA)
Project Summary
Prosody is the name of linguistic unit for pitch of the voice, stress, length of syllables and other units that are not vowel and consonants. Prosody is a feature of language that is indispensable to achieve good performance in speech understanding and synthesis. Second Language learners and researchers report that unnative-like prosody is the greatest hindrance to being understood by mother tongue speakers.
This study of Chinese and English represents a collaboration of the perspectives of linguistics and automatic spoken language processing in extracting, analyzing, and evaluating prosodic categories in large corpora of spoken discourse. We plan to study the syllable-timed and the stress-timed property in the two languages, extract the indicative prosodic features used to signal sentence boundaries, and the impact of tone on intonation.
The knowledge gained from this study will be used in the language processing project currently supported by DARPA that translates spoken Chinese to English text. This joint research will offer a unique opportunity for Dr. Liu and Dr. Edmondson to collaborate in three dimensions, as they represent two universities, two departments, and speak two languages, which bring the strength of the two PIs together and allow incorporation of more linguistic knowledge into automatic processing systems.
Advanced DNA Microarray Technologies based on Homologous Strand Exchange and Magnetic Nanomanipulation
Principal Investigators
Stephen Levene, Wenchuang (Walter) Hu (UTD), Yang Li (UTA)
Project Summary
Homologous base-pairing interactions are the physical basis for many nucleic-acid-based diagnostic and forensic techniques. Within the last decade, adaptation of nucleic-acid-hybridization methods to high-throughput technologies such as microarray analysis has dramatically advanced the identification of complex disease states, detection of mutations and polymorphisms, discovery of new drugs, and detection of pathogens.
Unfortunately, present technologies are restricted to targeting relatively short nucleic-acid-sequence motifs (on the order of 20-30 base pairs) because longer sequences can form relatively stable hybrids even in the presence of base mismatches of significant length or insertions/deletions on either nucleic-acid strand.
To overcome this limitation we will develop a novel microarray-based hybridization technology that exploits the homologous pairing of DNA strands driven by the RecA strand-exchange protein of E. coli. This protein-induced strand-association reaction is highly specific, chemically and mechanically reversible, and amenable to standard physical detection methods.
Using magnetic torque-induced dissocation of RecA-DNA complexes conjugated to magnetic nanoparticles, we will establish platform technologies for magnetic-field-dependent, RecA-mediated strand-association reactions as a novel method for detecting hybridization of motifs hundreds of base pairs in size.
Updated:
2006-04-11
