School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 70 Nanyang Drive, 637457 Singapore.
Nanotechnology. 2011 Apr 15;22(15):155604. doi: 10.1088/0957-4484/22/15/155604. Epub 2011 Mar 10.
With advances of quantum dots (QDs) in bioimaging applications, various materials have been used to coat QDs to reduce their nanotoxicity; however, the coating could introduce new toxic sources and quench the fluorescence in bioimaging applications. In this work, ZrO₂, an excellent ceramic material with low extinction coefficient and good biocompatibility, is utilized to coat CdTe QDs for the first time. Experimental results show that ZrO₂-QD nanocomposites with the size of ~30 nm possess enhanced fluorescence emission, lower nanotoxicity and gradually increased fluorescence under 350 nm light illumination. After functionalization with folic acid, they were applied to label cultured HeLa cells effectively. Therefore, the ZrO₂-QD nanocomposites could be promising biocompatible nanomaterials with strong fluorescence emission to replace or complement QDs in biomedical applications.
随着量子点（QDs）在生物成像应用中的发展，已经使用了各种材料来包覆 QDs 以降低其纳米毒性；然而，这种包覆可能会引入新的毒性来源，并在生物成像应用中猝灭荧光。在这项工作中，ZrO₂，一种具有低消光系数和良好生物相容性的优秀陶瓷材料，首次被用于包覆 CdTe QDs。实验结果表明，尺寸约为 30nm 的 ZrO₂-QD 纳米复合材料具有增强的荧光发射、更低的纳米毒性和在 350nm 光照射下逐渐增加的荧光。经过叶酸功能化后，它们有效地被用于标记培养的 HeLa 细胞。因此，ZrO₂-QD 纳米复合材料可能是一种有前途的生物相容性纳米材料，具有较强的荧光发射，可替代或补充生物医学应用中的 QDs。
