School of Precision Instrument and Optoelectronics Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China.
School of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Ave., Singapore 639798, Singapore.
Nano Lett. 2023 Apr 12;23(7):2502-2510. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.2c04123. Epub 2023 Mar 16.
Self-propelled micro/nanomotors are emergent intelligent sensors for analyzing extracellular biomarkers in circulating biological fluids. Conventional luminescent motors are often masked by a highly dynamic and scattered environment, creating challenges to characterize biomarkers or subtle binding dynamics. Here we introduce a strategy to amplify subtle signals by coupling strong light-matter interactions on micromotors. A smart whispering-gallery-mode microlaser that can self-propel and analyze extracellular biomarkers is demonstrated through a liquid crystal microdroplet. Lasing spectral responses induced by cavity energy transfer were employed to reflect the abundance of protein biomarkers, generating exclusive molecular labels for cellular profiling of exosomes derived from 3D multicellular cancer spheroids. Finally, a microfluidic biosystem with different tumor-derived exosomes was employed to elaborate its sensing capability in complex environments. The proposed autonomous microlaser exhibits a promising method for both fundamental biological science and applications in drug screening, phenotyping, and organ-on-chip applications.
自推进微/纳米马达是用于分析循环生物流体中外源生物标志物的新兴智能传感器。传统的发光马达通常被高度动态和散射的环境所掩盖，这给分析生物标志物或微妙的结合动力学带来了挑战。在这里，我们介绍了一种通过在微马达上耦合强的光物质相互作用来放大微妙信号的策略。通过液晶微滴，展示了一种可以自推进和分析细胞外生物标志物的智能声子回旋模式微激光器。通过腔能量转移引起的激光光谱响应来反映蛋白质生物标志物的丰度，为源自 3D 多细胞癌细胞球体的外泌体的细胞分析生成独特的分子标签。最后，采用具有不同肿瘤衍生外泌体的微流控生物系统来详细阐述其在复杂环境中的传感能力。所提出的自主微激光器为基础生物学科学以及在药物筛选、表型分析和器官芯片应用中的应用提供了一种很有前途的方法。
