Funded Projects

NanoLab

Research


The research that we are currently pursuing includes:

In here we aim to produce novel nanomaterial that is able to treat bacterial infections in bone cells without affecting the host cells.  

Staphylococcus aureus is the most frequent pathogen associated with a localized bone infection called osteomyelitis, which results in gradual bone loss. The depletion of osteoblasts due to infection hinders bone formation and results in bone loss. Intracellular survival and the ability of S. aureus to evade host immune response result in a recurrent and persistent infection, which present significant challenges in treating osteomyelitis. Extreme cases of osteomyelitis may lead to amputation of the affected limbs. Metallic nanoparticles of silver (Ag) and copper (Cu) exhibit potent antibacterial activity due to the release of lethal metallic ions and the generation of reactive oxygen species. The metallic nanoparticles may also induce organ and systemic toxicity in humans. Specific S. aureus components or overexpressed tissue biomarkers in bone infections could be targeted to deliver active therapeutics, thereby reducing drug dosage and systemic toxicity.
We have synthesized a complex alloy made of Ag-Cu-B that is able to cure infections without harming normal cells. Experiments on animals showed effective treatment.
Relevant Publications:
  • Abdulrehman T, Qadri S, Skariah S, Manour S, Azzi J, Haik Y “Boron Doped Silver-Copper Alloy Nanoparticle Targeting Intercellular S. aureus in Bone Cells,” PloS one, 15, No. 4, 2020.
  • Qadri S, Abdulrehman T, Azzi J, Mansour S, Haik Y, “AgCuB Nanoparticles Eradicates Intracellular S. Aureus Infection in Bone Cells: in vitro,” Emergent Materials, 1-13, 2019.
  • Qadri S, Haik Y, Mensah-Brown E, Bashir G, Fernandez-Cabezudo MJ, al-Ramadi BK, “Metallic Nanoparticles to Eradicate Bacterial Bone Infection,” Nanomedicine: Nanotechnology, Biology and Medicine, Vol. 13, Issue 7, PP. 2241-2250, 2017.
  • Ramadi K B, Mohamed Y A, Al-Sbiei A, Al Marzooqi S, Bashir G, Al Dhanhani A, Sarawathiamma D, Qadri S, Yasin J, Nemmar A, Fernandez-Cabezudo M J, Haik Y, al-Ramadi B K, “Acute Systemic Exposure to Silver-based Nanoparticles Induces Hepatotoxicity and NLRP3-dependent Inflammation,” Nanotoxicology, DOI: 10.3109/17435390.2016.1163743.

Relevant Patenets:

  • US 9,538,740, January 10, 2017, Red Palm Weevil Sensing and Control System

Magnetic refrigeration has the potential to mitigate long-standing refrigeration challenges such as high energy waste (up to 30% improvement), low system performance, and the impact on the climate due to refrigerant greenhouse effect. Magnetic cooling systems have better performance when operating under low temperatures and high magnetic fields, which impacts negatively its wide adoption to replace conventional refrigeration systems. Magnetic materials in general, exhibit magnetocaloric effect (MCE); however, this effect is normally weak at room temperature. The MCE is observed as the material changes its temperature (entropy) when the magnetic field strength is altered adiabatically. Recent advancements in the MCE focused on introducing a phase transition within the room temperature range to ensure large isothermal magnetic entropy at room temperature. Despite the possibility of observing a reasonably high MCE at room temperature, the requirement to apply a high magnetic field to induce such an effect significantly limits its applicability. We aim to synthesize, characterize and validate a system that would have a high magnetocaloric effect for magnetic cooling at room temperature and a high magnetoresistance (MR) value at low magnetic fields. The electrical, magnetic and transport properties in magnetic systems are influenced by the size, the disorder in the material, and the electron-electron interactions.

 

Relevant Publications:

  1. Rasras A, Hamdi R, Mansour S, Samara A, Haik Y “Study of the Magnetocaloric Effect in Single-Phase Antiferromagnetic GdMnO3” Journal of Physics and Chemistry of Solids, Vol. 149, 2021.
  2. Rasras A, Hamdi R, Mansour S, Samara A, Haik Y “Effect of Doping Concentration on Gd1-xAlxMnO3Structure and Magnetic Properties,” Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials, 2020.
  3. Hamdi R, Smari M, Bajorek A, Bessais L, Haik Y, Dhari E, Hayek S “Large Magnetocaloric Entropy Change in Ferrimagnetic Er1-xCO2 System at Cryogenic Temperatures” The role of Erbium Deficiency,” Applied Physics A, Vol. 127, pp.1-15, 2021.
  4. Rasras A, Hamdi R, Mansour S, Samara A, Haik Y “Effects of the Sintering Temperature on the La0.63Gd0.37MnO3 Structure and Magnetic Properties,” Applied Physics A, Vol. 126, pp.1-14, 2020
  5. Hamdi R, Smari M, Bajorek A, Nouri K, Bessais L, Hayek S, Dhahri E, Haik Y “Unconventional Critical Behavior of the Magnetic Refrigerant System Er0.98Co0.02 around its Ferromagnetic-Paramagnetic Transition,” Physica Scripta, Vol. 95, No. 5, 2020
  6. Hamdi R, Smari M, Bajorek A, Bessais L, E Dhahri, Samara A, Mansour S, Haik Y “Griffith Phase, Magnetic Memory and ac Susceptibility of an Antiferromagnetic Titanate-based Perovskite Er0.9Sr0.1Ti0.975Cr0.025O3 System” Physica Scripta, 2020
  7. Rasras A, Hamdi R, Mansour S, Samara A, Haik Y “Study of the Magnetocaloric Effect in Single Phase Antiferromagnetic GdMnO3,” Journal of Physics and Chemistry of Solids, 2020
  8. Smari M, Hamdi R, Slimani S, Bajorek A, Peddis D, Koneva U, Dhahri E, Haik Y “Enhancement of Magnetotransport Behavior in a Phase-Separated LaAgCaMnO3 Polycrystalline: Unraveling the Role of Multi-Double-Exchange Mechanism” Journal of Physical Chemistry, 2020.

Hydrogen production by electrochemical water splitting remains a promising approach for sustainable green energy. High performance and inexpensive electrocatalyst for the oxygen evolution reaction remains a bottleneck that hinders the practical application of water splitting process.  

Electrolysis of water consists of 02 half reactions i.e., water oxidation and reduction generally known as oxygen evolution reaction (OER) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), respectively.   These two half reactions are kinetically very slow and thermodynamically OER is the most energy-demanding process. Therefore, various electrocatalysts are being developed to improve the rate of oxygen and hydrogen production with the objective to make it an energy-efficient process.  We are currently working on different catalysts for water splitting

 

Relevant Publications:

  1. ul Haq, Mansour SA, Munir A, Haik Y “Gold-supported Gadolinium Doped CoB Amorphous Sheet: A new Benchmark Electrocatalyst for Water Oxidation with High Turnover Frequency,” Advanced Functional Materials, Vol. 30, No. 16, 2020.
  2. ulHaq T, Haik Y, Hussain I, urRehman H, Al-Ansari T, “Gd-Doped Ni-Oxychloride Nanoclusters: New Nanoscale Electrocatalysts for High-Performance Water Oxidation Through Surface and Structural Modification” ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, 2020.

While a number of drug delivery systems exist, their low disease tissue specificity, drug resistance and side effects are reducing their effectiveness. Drug carriers decorated with antibodies are used to improve tumor targeting, however, their immunogenicity, large size, cost and lack of well-defined surface receptors limits their application.

In order to address the challenges:

Developing anti-cancer drug out of inorganic alloys.

Al Tamimi, S, Ashraf S, Abdulrehman T, Parray A, Mansour SA, Haik Y “Synthesis and Analysis of Silver-Copper Alloy Nanoparticles of Different Ratios Manifest Anticancer Activity in Breast Cancer Cells,” Cancer Nanotechnology, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 1-16, 2020

 Developing smart multifunctional delivery systems

  • Mahgoub E O, Razmara E, Bitaraf A, Norouzi FA, Montazri M, Behzadii-AndouhjerdiR, Falahati M, Cheng K, Haik Y, Hasan Anwaarul, Babashah S, “Advances of Exosomes Isolation Techniques in Lung Cancer”, Molecular Biology Reports, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-020-05715-w, 2020.
  • Mahgoub EO, Haik Y, Qadri S, “Comparison Study of Exosomes Molecules Driven from NCI1975 NSCLC Cell Culture Supernatant Isolation and Characterization Techniques,” The FASEB Journal, 33, 647.22, 2019.
  • Ordikhani F, Uehara M, Kasinath V, Dai L, Eskanddari S K, Bahmani B, Yonar M, Azzi J, Haik Y, Sage P T, Murphy G F, Annabi N, Schatton T, Guleria I, Abdi R “Targeting Antigen-Presenting Cells by Anti-PD-1 Nanoparticles Augments Antitumor Immunity,” Journal of Clinical Investigation Insight, https://doi.org/10.1172/jci.insight.122700, 2018.
  • Bhmani B, Uehara M, Liang L, Ordikhani, Banouni N, Ichimura T, Solhjou Z, Furtmuller G, Branacher G, Alvarez D, von Andrian U, Uchimura K, Xu Q, Vohra I, Yilmam O A, Haik Y, Azzi J, Kasinath V, Bromber J, McGrath M, Abdi R “Targeted Delivery of Immune Therapeutics to Lymph Nodes Prolongs Cardiac Allograft Survival” The Journal of Clinical Investigation, DOI 10.1172/JCI120923, 2018.
  • Obaidat IM, Issa B, Haik Y, “Magnetic Properties of Magnetic Nanoparticles for Efficient Hyperthermia,” Nanomaterials, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 63-89, 2015.

 

We have developed techniques to improve sensor functions by increasing functional area or by utilizing semi-conductive polymers. 

Relevant Publications:

  1. Sarraj A, El Mel A, Saoud K, Haik Y “Optoelectronic Properties of Highly Porous Silver Oxide Thin Film, SN Applied Sciences, 2021.
  2. El Mel, A, Mansour S, Pasha M, Zekri A, Ponraj J, Shetty A, Haik, Y “Oxidation of Au/Ag Films by Oxygen Plasma: Phase Separation and Generation of Nanoporosity” Beilstein Journal of Nanotechnology, Vol. 11, pp. 1608-1614, 2020.
  3. El Mel, AA, Gauiter R, Stephant N, Tessier PY, Haik, Y, “Patterning of Silver on the Micro and Nano-scale by Local Oxidation Using Air Plasma,” Nano-Structures and Nano-Objects, 2019
  4. Ayesh A I, Ahmed R E, Al-Rashid M A, Alarrouqi R A, Abdulrehman T, Haik Y, Al-Sulaiti L A “Selective Gas Sensors using, Graphene and CuO nanorods” Sensors and Actuators A: Physical, 283, pp.107-112, 2018.
  5. El Mel A, Stephant N, Molina-Luna L, Gautron E, Haik Y, Tessier P-Y, Gautier R, “Kirkendall Effect Vs. Corrosion during the Oxidation of Silver by Atomic Oxygen: From an undesired Effect in Space Science to Versatile Synthesis Approach of Nanoporous Nanomaterials,” Journal of Physical Chemistry C, Vol. 121, No.35, pp.19497-19504, 2017.

Relevant Patents:

  1. JP 6002158, September 9, 2016, Semiconducting Polymer
  2. US 8,796,673, August 5, 2014, Semiconducting Polymer