Sodium yttrium fluoride based upconversion nano phosphors for biosensing

In the present study, NaYF4-Yb3+/Er3+ having the composition NaYF4-18%Yb3+/2%Er3+ and NaYF4-20%Yb3+/2%Er3+ with and without the addition of PVP (polyvinyl pyrolidone) have been synthesised by a solution method using NaF, yttrium nitrate, ytterbium nitrate and erbium nitrate as precursors. Upconversion spectra of prepared nanomaterial under 980 nm laser excitation have been studied. The variation in upconversion spectra with new born calf serum and myoglobin has been studied. Myoglobin (Mb) may be helpful when used in conjunction with other cardiac markers for rapid determination of acute myocardial ischemia, especially in patients with a typical chest pain or nonspecific ECG changes. The variation of UC fluorescence with addition of Mb indicates the suitability of using NaYF4 based UC nanoparticles in cardiac marker detection. The detailed study is currently under progress

Dimeric Gold Nanoparticle Assemblies as Tags for SERS- Based Cancer Detection

Herein, a new class of multifunctional materials combining a clustered nanoparticle-based probe is presented for surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS)-based microscopy and surface functionalization for tissue targeting. Controlled assembly of spherical gold nanoparticles into dimers (DNP-REP) is engineered using a small, rigid Raman-active dithiolated linking reporter (REP) to yield narrow internanoparticle gaps and to strategically generate the “hot spot” while concurrently placing the reporter within the region of highest SERS enhancement. Peptide functionalized DNP-REP materials are highly stable even upon incubation with living cells and show controlled levels of binding and intracellular endocytosis. To demonstrate the functionality of such probes for disease detection, differentially targeted DNP-REPs are incubated over various time points with cultured human glioblastoma cells. Using human glioblastoma cells, the SERS maps of targeted tumor cells show the markedly enhanced signals of the DNP-REP, compared to conventional confocal fluorescence based approaches, especially at low incubation times. Even with as few as 40 internalized DNP-REP, a relatively intense SERS signal is measured, demonstrating the high signal to noise ratio and inherent biocompatibility of the materials. Thus, these Raman reporter-based nanoparticle cluster probes present a promising and versatile optical imaging tool for fast, reliable, selective, and ultrasensitive tissue targeting and disease detection and screening

Facile synthesis of stable and water-dispersible multihydroxy conjugated polymer nanoparticles with tunable size by dendritic cross-linking

10.1021/mz300282sACS Macro Letters18927-93

Continuous injection synthesis of indium arsenide quantum dots emissive in the short-wavelength infrared

With the emergence of applications based on short-wavelength infrared light, indium arsenide quantum dots are promising candidates to address existing shortcomings of other infrared-emissive nanomaterials. However, III–V quantum dots have historically struggled to match the high-quality optical properties of II–VI quantum dots. Here we present an extensive investigation of the kinetics that govern indium arsenide nanocrystal growth. Based on these insights, we design a synthesis of large indium arsenide quantum dots with narrow emission linewidths. We further synthesize indium arsenide-based core-shell-shell nanocrystals with quantum yields up to 82% and improved photo- and long-term storage stability. We then demonstrate non-invasive through-skull fluorescence imaging of the brain vasculature of murine models, and show that our probes exhibit 2–3 orders of magnitude higher quantum yields than commonly employed infrared emitters across the entire infrared camera sensitivity range. We anticipate that these probes will not only enable new biomedical imaging applications, but also improved infrared nanocrystal-LEDs and photon-upconversion technology.National Science Foundation (U.S.) (EECS-1449291)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Laser Biomedical Research Center. 9-P41-EB015871-26A1)Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies (W911NF-13-D-0001)Boehringer Ingelheim FondsEuropean Molecular Biology Organization (Long-term Fellowship)National Science Foundation (U.S.). Graduate Research Fellowship ProgramAmerican Society for Engineering Education. National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate FellowshipUnited States. Dept. of Energy. Center for Excitonics (DE- SC0001088)