Ultrashort Laser Nanomanufacturing Research Facility, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, M5B 2K3, ON, Canada.
BioNanoInterface Facility, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, M5B 2K3, ON, Canada.
Nat Commun. 2018 Aug 3;9(1):3065. doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-05237-x.
Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS)-based cancer diagnostics is an important analytical tool in early detection of cancer. Current work in SERS focuses on plasmonic nanomaterials that suffer from coagulation, selectivity, and adverse biocompatibility when used in vitro, limiting this research to stand-alone biomolecule sensing. Here we introduce a label-free, biocompatible, ZnO-based, 3D semiconductor quantum probe as a pathway for in vitro diagnosis of cancer. By reducing size of the probes to quantum scale, we observed a unique phenomenon of exponential increase in the SERS enhancement up to ~10 at nanomolar concentration. The quantum probes are decorated on a nano-dendrite platform functionalized for cell adhesion, proliferation, and label-free application. The quantum probes demonstrate discrimination of cancerous and non-cancerous cells along with biomolecular sensing of DNA, RNA, proteins and lipids in vitro. The limit of detection is up to a single-cell-level detection.
基于表面增强拉曼散射（SERS）的癌症诊断是癌症早期检测的一种重要分析工具。目前 SERS 的研究集中在等离子体纳米材料上，这些纳米材料在体外使用时存在凝聚、选择性和不良的生物相容性问题，限制了这项研究仅限于独立的生物分子传感。在这里，我们引入了一种无标记、生物相容的基于 ZnO 的 3D 半导体量子探针，作为体外癌症诊断的一种途径。通过将探针的尺寸缩小到量子尺度，我们观察到 SERS 增强呈指数级增加到纳米摩尔浓度约 10 的独特现象。量子探针被修饰在纳米枝晶平台上，该平台具有用于细胞黏附、增殖和无标记应用的功能。量子探针能够区分癌细胞和非癌细胞，并进行体外的 DNA、RNA、蛋白质和脂质的生物分子传感。检测极限可达单细胞水平。
