Micron-scale Surface Chemical Gradients
This project will develop the Australian capacity to manufacture, using plasma processing technology, microarrays of gradient chemical activity at the biologically relevant micron scale. The micron-scale synthetic gradients thus fabricated will be sufficiently robust for use in a wide range of diverse technologies in addition to the traditional role of microarrays in genomics, proteomics and pharmaceutical development. Such applications include, for example, the study of tissue and bodily fluid interactions leading to more efficacious medical devices; life science applications such as disease detection, drug discovery and diagnostics and forensic analysis in fields as diverse as environmental remediation and law enforcement. Whilst development of this technology will enable the preparation of microarrays with a very wide range of chemistries the real technological advance will be the reproducible fabrication of these chemical gradients on a micro-scale. A further important aspect of this project will be its compatibility with existing microelectronics fabrication technology: hence offering the potential for massive scale up.