IEEE Transactions on NanoBioscience


Scope of IEEE T-NB

"Basic and applied papers dealing with molecular and subcellular systems and related technology in the nanometer range. Biotechnological, biological and medical applications will be covered. The journal aims to integrate a common scientific body of knowledge and related methodological areas within genomics, proteomics and nanobiotechnology.".

IEEE Transactions on NanoBioscience will address such themes as:

  • Methods for fabricating nanostructured biomaterials.
  • The biocompatibility of materials at the nanometer scale.
  • Cell-cell interaction and cell mechanics at the nano scale.
  • Nanotechnology as applied to biomolecules and cells.
  • Tissue engineering at the nano scale, e.g., for wound repair and replacement of skin, cartilage, bone, nerve and other tissues.
  • Bioinformatics, biocomputing and molecular computing.
  • Measurement and sensing of single cells, cell systems and biomolecules by optical, chemical or physical methods (including molecular biosensors).
  • Engineered surfaces using assembled molecular arrays to guide interactions with biomolecules and cells.
  • Effects of electric and magnetic fields on biomolecules.
  • Molecular electronics and nanoscale diagnostic devices.
Outline of Scope of TNB
Nanobioscience can be approached from several different regions of enquiry. The aim of this journal will be to encourage these approaches and in particular their synthesis into more coherent interdisciplinary wholes. Biosciencists have already extended their areas of enquiry from macrosystems down to the findings of electron microscopy and other fine structure methods but have not found discrete regions of scale upon which to settle. But Nanobioscience is the area the Editors believe, where strong justifications can be found for defining a field by the range of sizes of the systems we consider. The reason is well known to many. Namely, the fact that many of the molecular and inter-object forces that operate in such systems do not have sufficient range to produce micro-effects. As we drop below the 300 nm limit, the number of forces that may be active increases. This has the effect that you cannot use the procedures of scaling down to predict the nanoworld from the micro- or other larger worlds. Indeed our knowledge of these forces, often seen in colloidal systems, is less complete than can be desired. This then justifies a focus on the nanoworld. Several themes are evident.

The abilities of the nanofabricator are now such that specific experimental structures can be made to test for the actions of various forces even at the nanoscale. Thus techniques and instrumentation for testing in biology is particularly of interest to these Transactions. Measurement and sensing of single cells, cell systems and biomolecules by optical, chemical, or physics methods, molecular biosensors (for example nanoscale diagnosis devices for the analysis of the effects of drugs on cell systems) and the effects of electric and magnetic fields on molecules, cells and tissues are all areas of great interest for this journal.

Another aspect of Nanobioscience that we invite in the Transactions is the description and understanding of the role and/or mechanism of ordered structure in living systems: i.e. the possible function of naturally occurring nanodetail in biological systems. Examples of these include the unwettable leaf surfaces of the lotus (Nelumbo) or the skin features of the dolphin but many other systems need investigation. Such studies will be especially relevant to practical applications of nanobioscience. In every tissue there is a certain amount of ordered nanodetail around cells ranging from intercellular gaps to collagen or elastin molecules. So a related area is attempting to understand how order and structure develops in cells or in extracellular materials such as bone, shell or wood. Understanding the role of nano-structure is important to advances of interest to this journal, including both experimental and modeling studies of cellular system analysis, cell culture methods and tissue engineering aspects at the nano scale (wound repair, skin, cartilage, bone, neural tissue, hematopoietic system, liver, kidney, prostheses, etc.).

Some scientists will approach the field from quite a different quarter. Instead of examining wild nature they choose to study the role of structures indirectly, by examining the reactions of cells to carefully produced nanodetail in say a support surface. Reactions of cells to various surface detail can be a clue to the biocell’s own structure and mechanisms. Nanofabrication methods will include electron-beam lithography and submicrometric photolithography, and the developing areas of self-assembly and nanocontact printing. Some papers on this type of work are already in press in the Transactions. We encourage more. Related to this type of work are questions about the sensing of nanodetail by cells, the importance of order and symmetry in nanodetail in cell to cell or cell to surface adhesion, and the scale range over which effects are maintained. In turn this should lead to important opportunities for modeling. There are already suggestions that cells may be able to detect defects in nanodetail as small as a lateral mismatch of 5nm. The implications for applications in biosensors (environmental, clinical), and implanted tissue replacements are clear. Related areas of interest are: engineering surfaces based on assembly of arrays of molecules; patterning for guiding specific interactions with biomolecules and cells; functional molecular material and its assembly technology; biocompatibility of materials studied at the nanometric scale.

The intercellular spaces between cells are in effect reverse casts of the nanostructure surrounding the cells . These spaces are one of the main transport routes between cells. In what ways do the nanofeatures of these channels affect medium transport and permeation? This in turn suggests that papers on nanohydrodynamics are very pertinent to cell function at the nanoscale. This has important biological and clinical implications when we consider kidney function, transpiration in plants and micro-vascular events. Related to this topic are those about the interaction of nanoparticles with cells. Such nanoparticles may be biological (shed parts of cells or viruses, pharmacological agents) or artificial (breakdown of implant surfaces). Their behaviour is of importance to nanomedicine, and their detection may be possible by merging biosensors into implant surfaces.

Finally, molecular design and principles and systems of molecular computing, genomics and proteomics are areas within the scope of this journal, both with respect to experimental methods and techniques and with respect to bioinformatics, which plays a key role in the current post-genomics era. Data mining tools, computer based methods for the determination of sequence-structure relations in proteins and computer modelling for the study of proteins and their interactions, DNA microarrays and their related computer based analysis are significant examples. Individual molecules can be used to perform functions in electronic circuitry now performed by semiconductor devices. Individual molecules are much smaller than the smallest features currently obtained by semiconductor technology. The dramatic reduction in size and subsequent increase in computing density, are the main advantages of molecular electronics. The design of molecules with specific electronic function and their self assembly into supramolecular structures with specific electronic function, cyclic peptide nanotubes as scaffolds for conducting devices and carbon nanotubes are examples of promising applications of molecular electronics that we encourage for this journal.