Collaborative Research: Wireless Implantable NanoEAB Sensors for Opioid Monitoring in the Brain

About This Grant

Opioid use disorder (OUD) and addiction affects approximately 3.7% of U.S. adults (9.37 million) and caused more than 70,000 deaths from fentanyl overdoses in 2023. However, we have a limited understanding of where, when, and how opioids modulate the diverse behavioral outputs of the brain. This is partly due to the limited technology available for in vivo opioid monitoring in the brain. This project aims to develop new technology to monitor fentanyl in the brain. The developed technology has a significant impact in several settings. It offers urgently needed technologies to understand with high spatiotemporal resolution how opioids modulate diverse behavioral outputs of the brain. Moreover, the underlying bioelectronic design principles and knowledge generated will be applicable to other fields, including biosensors for therapeutic drug monitoring, immune response tracking, and chronic disease management. The project will involve high school and undergraduate students. Students will receive training in experimental techniques, data analysis, and scientific writing. New course modules leveraging the results of the work will be incorporated into existing undergraduate and graduate courses at North Carolina State University and the University of Connecticut. The goal of the project is to develop and characterize a wireless bioelectronic system for high-performance fentanyl monitoring in the brain of freely moving small animal models. To achieve this goal, we will: 1) isolate, characterize, and engineer aptamers targeting fentanyl, a primary opioid associated with OUD, 2) develop an implantable nanoporous electrochemical aptamer-based (nanoEAB) fentanyl sensor, and study the structure–property relationship of a new surface coating to improve its in vivo longevity, and 3) establish and validate a wireless bioelectronic system for fentanyl monitoring in the brain of freely moving animals. The project will significantly advance the design and development of wireless bioelectronic systems for high-performance fentanyl monitoring in the brain. Additionally, the developed fentanyl sensors could serve as a technology platform for developing wearable emergency response systems for real-time opioid monitoring and closed-loop delivery of therapeutic drugs such as naloxone. Finally, due to the generalizability of the aptamer selection and nanoEAB platform, this technology will serve as a template for designing sensors for monitoring other molecules of biomedical interest by simply replacing the aptamers functionalized on the sensor surface. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.