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Articles

Polish-American nicotine trap

A polymer with tongs that catch nicotine molecules has been developed by Polish and American scientists. The achievement will be used to build nicotine detectors and nicotine patches releasing the substance over a longer period and more evenly.

The construction of a polymer nicotine trap was possible through the cooperation of scientists from the Institute of Physical Chemistry PAS (Instytutu Chemii Fizycznej PAN, IChF) and the Faculty of Chemistry, Wichita State University. "Polymer equipped with molecular tongs efficiently traps particles of nicotine and its derivatives, and it may also release them in a controlled manner" - according to the IchF release.

Polymer with nicotine-catching tongs can be used in sensors for analysis of nicotine concentration in tobacco leaves, and in biomedical research on the content of nicotine metabolites in body fluids of patients.

Another potential use are nicotine patches helping to fight tobacco addiction. With the new polymer, patches could release nicotine over a longer period and more evenly.

"The first nicotine trap was synthesized few years ago by our American partner. It consisted of molecular tongs, particles floating freely in a solution and forming complexes with nicotine. Now we managed to mount the ticks tongs inside of one of the polymers. The substance has a solid form, so that we could use it to build detectors" - said Prof. Włodzimierz Kutner of the IChF.

Scientists from the IChF explained that patent-pending polymer nicotine trap was built from metalloporphyrin derivative, a substance occurring in human blood. Its molecule contains a ring with centrally located zinc atom. To this ring, scientists attached amide tongs (amides are organic chemical compounds). Nicotine binds to such polymer with its two nitrogen atoms, one forms a bond with the zinc atom, the second with tongs.

"With the specific, two-point bond we have greater confidence that the caught molecule is nicotine" - said Dr. Eng. Krzysztof Noworyta of the IChF, adding that in one of the developed polymers tongs are located on both sides of the zinc ring plane. "This design significantly increases the efficiency of nicotine trapping" - said Noworyta.

How will the scientists catch nicotine? They will use a device called a piezoelectric resonator, covered with a layer of polymer. Captured nicotine particles increase the mass of the layer, which changes the oscillation frequency of the resonator.

"You could say that we simply continuously weigh our polymer layer. As we know how much is weighed at the beginning, and we know that it captures only nicotine and its compounds, the increase in weight indicates the presence of these substances in the solution" - said Dr. Noworyta.

The IChF experts explained that the volume acoustic wave quartz resonators used in the experiments with the new polymer enable the detection of nicotine in solutions. In the near future, scientists plan to engage in cooperation with manufacturers of surface wave resonators. "This type of resonators vibrate with much higher frequencies, so they are more sensitive and, when covered with nicotine-trapping polymer, could also detect nicotine in gases" - reported the IChF.

The new polymer was developed under the grant "Quantum semiconductor nanostructures for applications in biology and medicine", in 85 percent financed from the European Regional Development Fund. It was awarded to seven Polish scientific institutions for purposes including the construction of prototype diagnostic devices intended for applications in medicine, biology and environmental protection. Nearly 50 employees of the Institute of Physical Chemistry are involved in implementing the grant.

* Polymer nicotine trap consists of a porphyrin derivative (black), in which amide tongs (green) are attached to the macrocycle (blue) containing zinc (purple). Nicotine molecule is shown in red. The lower graphic is a three-dimensional visualization of the polymer.

PAP - Science and Scholarship in Poland

last modification: 2011-08-22

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Polish-American nicotine trap

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