College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China.
Nanoscale. 2017 Jul 6;9(26):9049-9055. doi: 10.1039/c7nr02038d.
The development of the multimodal probes is of great importance for bioimaging application. Herein, we report the fabrication of a functional nanocomposite from near-infrared (NIR) persistent luminescent nanoparticles (PLNPs) and GdO as a multimodal probe for in vivo NIR persistent luminescence and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging. Small-sized monodispersed NIR ZnGaO:Cr PLNPs (ca. 15 nm) were prepared as the NIR persistent luminescence source by a hydrothermal method while hyaluronic acid (HA) functionalized GdO (HA-GdO) was synthesized as the MR contrast agent via a biomineralization approach. An EDC/NHS coupling strategy was used to connect the amino functionalized PLNPs and the HA-GdO to give the HA functionalized multimodal probe. The multimodal probe not only exhibits an excellent NIR persistent luminescence signal, but also exhibits larger longitudinal relaxivity (7.38 mM s) than commercial contrast agent Gd-DTPA. Moreover, the HA moieties not only enhance the biocompatibility of the multimodal probe, but also endow the probe with tumor-targeting capability. Both in vitro and in vivo bioimaging experiments demonstrate the potential of the multimodal probe for tumor-targeting NIR persistent luminescence and MR imaging.
多功能探针的发展对于生物成像应用具有重要意义。在此，我们报告了一种由近红外（NIR）持续发光纳米粒子（PLNPs）和 GdO 制成的功能纳米复合材料的制备，用作体内 NIR 持续发光和磁共振（MR）成像的多功能探针。通过水热法制备了小尺寸单分散近红外 ZnGaO：Cr PLNPs（约 15nm）作为 NIR 持续发光源，而通过生物矿化方法合成了透明质酸（HA）功能化 GdO（HA-GdO）作为 MR 造影剂。使用 EDC/NHS 偶联策略将氨基功能化的 PLNPs 和 HA-GdO 连接起来，得到 HA 功能化的多功能探针。该多功能探针不仅表现出优异的 NIR 持续发光信号，而且其纵向弛豫率（7.38mM s）也大于商业造影剂 Gd-DTPA。此外，HA 部分不仅增强了多功能探针的生物相容性，而且赋予了探针肿瘤靶向能力。体外和体内生物成像实验均证明了该多功能探针在肿瘤靶向 NIR 持续发光和 MR 成像中的应用潜力。
