Nanobiogeochemistry of Microbe/Mineral Interactions: A Force Microscopy and Bioinformatics Approach

In the original proposal (section 5, General Approach and Hypotheses, and Section 6, Research Plan), the planned research program for this three-year project was divided into three major tasks. These included research involving (1) biological force microscopy to study intermolecular forces between whole bacterial cells and minerals, (2) chemical force microscopy to study interactions between discrete biomolecules and mineral surfaces, and (3) molecular modeling of interactions between functional groups on biological and mineralogical surfaces. Dr. Lower was in charge of task 1, biological force microscopy. Dr. Lower has been involved in tasks 2 and 3 but, as these are under the supervision of Dr. Hochella, these tasks will not be discussed herein