School of Chemistry

Andrew Nelson

Professor in Nanotoxicology
Research section: Physical Chemistry

Contact details

Keywords

Organised phospholipid layers
Surface induced phase transitions
Nanoparticle/membrane interaction
Toxicity sensing

Research interests

Biological membranes are critical to a cell's function. Phospholipid bilayers form the backbone to the biomembrane and are held together with the protein enzymes and ion channels in a highly organised state by intermolecular forces of self-assembly. We are able to construct organised artificial membranes composed of phospholipids and other entities and support them in a very stable configuration on a solid and/or liquid surface. We can interrogate the membrane's organisation and function using electrochemical and optical techniques. Interaction of these model membranes with toxic agents and/or nanoparticles disrupts their organisation and modifies the function of the component proteins. These properties are utilised in the development of biologically relevant on-line high throughput toxicity sensors. Current research is funded by the MoD/Dstl, EPSRC, NATO, EU FP7, Royal Society, Leverhulme Trust and Modern Water PLC.

Useful links

The Centre for Molecular Nanoscience   
NATO biomembrane sensor project   
   

Selected publications

E.Protopapa, S. Maude; A. Aggeli,.A.Nelson, 2009, Interaction of Self-Assembling beta-Sheet Peptides with Phospholipid Monolayers: The Role of Aggregation State, Polarity, Charge and Applied Field Langmuir 25, 3289-3296.

Z. Coldrick, M.Davies, P.A.Millner, D.P.Steenson, A. Nelson, 2009, Phospholipid monolayer coated microfabricated electrodes to model the interaction of molecules with biomembranes , Electrochim.Acta 54,4944-4962.

J.Monne, Y.Diez, J.Puy, J.Galceran, A.Nelson, 2007, Interpreting ion fluxes to channel arrays in monolayers, Langmuir, 23,10581-10588.

A.Nelson, 2007, Electrochemical analysis of a phospholipid phase transition, Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry, 601,83-93.