| Project Id
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BRJP26100082
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| Project Detail
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| Project Title
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Intrinsically Chiral Metal Nanoparticles as a New Class of Enantioselective Nanozymes
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| Senior Supervision Team (BITS)
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| Supervisor name and Title
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Amrita Chakraborty
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School or Department (or company, if applicable)
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BITS PILANI, HYDERABAD CAMPUS
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Email ID
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amrita.chakraborty@hyderabad.bits-pilani.ac.in
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| URL for more info
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https://www.bits-pilani.ac.in/hyderabad/profamritachakraborty/
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| a) Are you currently supervising a BITS or RMIT HDR student?
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YES
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| Please comment how many you are supervising
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1
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| b) Have you supervised an offshore candidate before?
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NO
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| If no, what support structures do you have in place?
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|
| If yes, please elaborate
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N
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| Senior Supervision Team (RMIT)
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| Supervisor name and Title
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Vipul Bansal
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School or Department (or company, if applicable)
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STEM
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Email ID
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vipul.bansal@rmit.edu.au
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| URL for more info
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https://www.rmit.edu.au/contact/staff-contacts/academic-staff/b/bansal-professor-vipul
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| a) Are you currently supervising a BITS or RMIT HDR student?
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YES
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| Please comment how many you are supervising
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15
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| b) Have you supervised an offshore candidate before?
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YES
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| If no, what support structures do you have in place?
|
|
| If yes, please elaborate
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Supervised ~40 HDR candidates in last two decades, including several AcSIR students. All students well settled in academia and industries on senior positions, including 4 Full Professors.
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| Other Supervisors (BITS)
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| Supervisor name and Title
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School or Department (or company, if applicable)
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| Phone Number (Optional)
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Email ID
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| URL for more info
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| Other Supervisors (BITS)
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| Supervisor name and Title
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Rajesh Ramanathan, Professor
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School or Department (or company, if applicable)
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STEM
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| Phone Number (Optional)
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61431398517
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Email ID
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rajesh.ramanathan@rmit.edu.au
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| URL for more info
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https://www.rmit.edu.au/profiles/r/rajesh-ramanathan
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| Field of Research (For Codes)
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| 340301 | Inorganic materials (incl. nanomaterials) | 35.00 |
| 340304 | Optical properties of materials | 30.00 |
| 340601 | Catalysis and mechanisms of reactions | 35.00 |
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| Project Description
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|
Biomolecules present in body fluids serve as critical biomarkers for early disease diagnosis, monitoring of progression, and evaluation of therapeutic efficacy. Nanozymes, artificial enzyme mimics, have emerged as attractive alternatives to natural enzymes owing to their low cost, high stability, and scalable production. For instance, Cu- and Ag-based bimetallic nanozymes have demonstrated promise for non-invasive glucose detection in urine, enabling monitoring of blood glucose levels, kidney function, and diabetes-associated vascular complications.
However, the conventional nanozyme biosensors typically lack molecular recognition elements. Enantiomeric discrimination is crucial in biological and pharmaceutical systems, and while naturally chiral ligands such as aptamers and peptide nanostructures have been conjugated to metallic nanoparticles to impart selectivity, their enantioselectivity has not been explicitly studied. This limitation highlights the need to explore intrinsically chiral nanostructures as next-generation enantioselective nanozymes.
Herein, we propose to investigate metallic nanoparticles with intrinsic structural chirality (ICNPs) as a new class of chiral nanozymes. Gold nanohelicoids synthesized via seeded growth in the presence of chirality inducing small molecules exhibit exceptionally high asymmetry (g) factors, making them promising candidates for selective chiral sensing and catalysis.
Proposed methodology: (a) Synthesize Au ICNPs of different geometries (rod-like, cube-like and triangular) through simple wet-chemical routes and evaluate their enzyme-mimetic catalytic activity at BITS, (b) incorporate a second metal (Ag, Cu, Pt etc.) into the shape-optimized Au ICNPs to tune their electronic structure for enhanced catalytic efficiency, (c) develop colorimetric and surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS)-based assays for urine biomarker detection in collaboration with Dist. Prof. Vipul Bansal at RMIT, and finally (d) integrate optimized ICNP nanozymes into a prototype point-of-care (POC) diagnostic platform for translational validation.
ICNPs have already demonstrated superior performance over conventional plasmonic nanoprobes in label-free SERS-based enantiomeric discrimination. Therefore, extending their application to nanozyme catalysis offers the potential to redefine selectivity in point-of-care diagnostics.
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| Project Deliverable/Outcomes
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The proposed research is expected to establish a fundamental understanding of chirality-induced selectivity of enzyme-mimic reactions. Most biomolecules being chiral, plasmonic nanoparticles are often functionalized with aptamers, peptides etc. for target recognition. Intrinsically chiral metallic nanostructures (ICNPs) will introduce a new design paradigm for nanozymes in which structural chirality itself acts as the molecular recognition element
mitigating the need of functionalizing the NPs with chiral ligands.
Gold-based ICNPs will serve as a proof-of-concept platform, followed by strategic alloying with Ag, Cu, or Pt to enhance catalytic performance and plasmonic response. The project will deliver:
• A new class of intrinsically chiral nanozymes for selective biomolecular detection
• Structure–chirality–activity correlations linking g-factor to catalytic selectivity
• A validated colorimetric/SERS-based assay for enantioselective biomarker detection in urine
• A prototype point-of-care sensing platform
The project will provide trans-sectoral training to a PhD scholar in advanced nanomaterial synthesis, high-resolution optical spectroscopy, SERS, correlated electron microscopy, and clinical biochemistry. Through interdisciplinary collaboration between BITS and RMIT, it will foster expertise at the interface of nanomaterials, catalysis, and biomedical diagnostics. As the project advances beyond its fundamental discovery phase, it is likely to involve Professor Bansal’s industry partners (Nexsen) to convert discovery into translatable outcomes.
Anticipated outcomes include high-quality peer-reviewed publications (top 10%), intellectual property in nanozyme-based diagnostic platforms, and development of skilled manpower in advanced nanoscience. In the long term, this platform can be extended to detect a broad spectrum of biomedical and environmentally relevant analytes, contributing to next-generation rapid, sensitive, and selective diagnostic technologies.
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| Research Impact Themes
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| BETTER HEALTH OUTCOMES | AFFORDABLE HEALTH AND PREVENTABLE DISEASES |
| Life sciences | Biotechnology and Bioengineering |
| ADVANCED MATERIALS, MANUFACTURING AND FABRICATION | NOVEL MATERIALS |
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| Which RMIT Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) does your project align to
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GOOD HEALTH AND WELLBEING
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| Which RMIT Enabling Impact Platform (EIP) does your project align to
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ADVANCED MATERIALS, MANUFACTURING AND FABRICATION
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| Which RMIT Program code will this project sit under?
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DR229 PhD (AppliedChemistry)
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| Student Capabilities and Qualifications
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Inorganic nanomaterial synthesis, spectroscopic techniques (UV-vis, DLS, FTIR, Circular Dichroism, Raman, Fluorescence)
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Electron microscopy (SEM/TEM), optical properties of nanoparticles, nano-bioconjugation
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MSc
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| Preferred discipline of Student
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| Materials Chemistry |
| Materials Engineering |
| MSc in Chemistry |
| MSc in material science |
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