Microscopias de varredura por sondas aplicadas ao estudo de amostras biológicas, vítreas e cerâmicas

Abstract

In this work, scanning multiprobes microscopes were used to study the physical properties of biological, vitreous and ceramics samples. In particular, we have used three different scanning probe microscopy techniques to the study the samples. At first, an atomic force microscope was used to evaluate the mechanical properties of macrophages due to cell adhesion to an extracellular matrix and to study the changes in DNA molecules conformation treated with thymol and adsorbed onto a mica surface modified by poly-L-lysine. The results of these studies show that the cytoskeleton-mediated cell-matrix interactions directly affect biomechanical events in cells by modifying physical properties of the cytoskeleton and that the modification of mica surface using poly-L-Lysine provides a strong and firm bond with DNA. This strong fixation of DNA, allows the study of DNA conformational change on mica when interacting with tymol. The atomic force microscope was also used in studies of laser induced thermal expansion in commercial phosphate glasses. The ability of this technique to detect nanoscale surface deformations and the good agreement between theoretical and experimental results show the potential of this technique to study the amplitude and the dynamic of thermal effects in solid materials. In another study, conductive atomic force microscopy was used to analyze electrical properties of barium titanate semiconductor ceramic and their correlation with specific topographic features of the sample. Finally, using the scanning near-field optical microscopy, we studied interactions between cells and gold nanoparticles, without the need of fluorescent labeling on the nanoparticles, with high spatial resolution. During the presentation of these studies the challenges and necessary instrumentation for their realization was discussed.