Synthesis and In Vitro Testing of YVO:Eu@silica-NH-GDA-IgG Bio-Nano Complexes for Labelling MCF-7 Breast Cancer Cells.

We present a visual tool and facile method to detect MCF-7 breast cancer cells by using YVO:Eu@silica-NH-GDA-IgG bio-nanocomplexes. To obtain these complexes, YVO:Eu nanoparticles with a uniform size of 10-25 nm have been prepared firstly by the hydrothermal process, followed by surface functionalization to be bio-compatible and conjugated with cancer cells. The YVO:Eu@silica-NH-GDA-IgG nanoparticles exhibited an enhanced red emission at 618 nm under an excitation wavelength of 355 nm and were strongly coupled with MCF-7 breast cancer cells via biological conjugation. These bio-nanocomplexes showed a superior sensitiveness for MCF-7 cancer cell labelling with a detection percentage as high as 82%, while no HEK-293A healthy cells were probed under the same conditions of in vitro experiments. In addition, the detection percentage of MCF-7 breast cancer cells increased significantly via the functionalization and conjugation of YVO:Eu nanoparticles. The experimental results demonstrated that the YVO:Eu@silica-NH-GDA-IgG bio-nanocomplexes can be used as a promising labelling agent for biomedical imaging and diagnostics.