EMILIE – ESTABLISHING A NEW PARADIGM IN NANOMATERIALS CHARACTERIZATION | EMILIE | Proyecto | Ficha informativa | HORIZON | CORDIS

Descripción del proyecto

Medidas para avanzar en el estudio de las nanopartículas

Las nanotecnologías están transformando sectores como la medicina, la agricultura y la cosmética; sin embargo, su progreso se ve limitado por la falta de herramientas avanzadas para estudiar las partículas diminutas. Sin estas herramientas, solo unos pocos nanofármacos han llegado al mercado, y las fábricas pierden dinero debido a los contaminantes no detectados. Además, los nanocontaminantes peligrosos, como los aerosoles diminutos y los nanoplásticos, no están regulados, causan graves problemas de salud, como cáncer y obesidad, y contribuyen a quinientas mil muertes anuales en la Unión Europea (UE). Es urgente mejorar el estudio de las nanopartículas. Para resolver este problema, el equipo del proyecto EMILIE, financiado por el Consejo Europeo de Innovación, ha creado un innovador analizador infrarrojo (IR) que utiliza tecnología de detección nanoelectromecánica. Permite acelerar el estudio de las nanopartículas, lo hace más preciso y asequible, lo que abre nuevas oportunidades para el sistema sanitario, la protección del medio ambiente y la industria.

Objetivo

Nanotechnologies have had a major role to play in the modernization and revolution of many industries such as agriculture, food, cosmetics, medicine, healthcare, automotive, oil and gas industries, chemical, and mechanical industries. However, the development of scientific instrumentation capable of handling such small samples and characterizing them has been lagging. As a result, very few nanomedicines have been commercialized so far due in part to the challenges in their characterization, semiconductor fabs and chemical suppliers suffer yield reductions and profit losses due to unidentified nanoscale contaminants, and unfortunately, nanopollutants, such as airborne aerosols with sizes smaller than 2.5 m and nanoplastics remain unregulated for lack of effective routine monitoring technologies, resulting in unnecessary deaths (500,000 yearly deaths in the EU caused by air pollution alone), increased diseases (nanoplastics have been linked to cancer, obesity, diabetes,) and hundreds of billions of euros in associated healthcare costs. There exists a current pressing need to fill the technological gap in the analysis of nanoparticles. During the NEMILIES EIC Transition project, we developed EMILIE, an innovative infrared (IR) analyser based on groundbreaking nanoelectromechanical sensing (NEMS) technology which pushes the boundaries of traditional Fourier transform IR (FTIR) spectroscopy. By significantly enhancing the sensitivity of traditional FTIRs and cutting down analysis times as well as instrument acquisition costs, EMILIE opens an array of new possibilities in nanomaterials characterization, paving the way to breakthroughs in environmental monitoring, nanomedicines, and more. However, several barriers must still be overcome to commercialise EMILIE and fully realise its potential. The objective of this booster project is to open the pathway to the commercialisation of EMILIE by addressing standardization, regulation, and intellectual property issues.