ABSTRACT
Until recently, many contrast agents widely used in biological imaging have absorbed and emitted in the visible region, limiting their usefulness for deeper tissue imaging. In order to push the boundaries of deep tissue imaging with non-ionizing radiation, contrast agents in the near infrared (NIR) regime, which is not strongly absorbed or scattered by most tissues, are being sought after. Upconverting nanoparticles (UCNPs) are attractive candidates since their upconversion emission is tunable with a very narrow bandwidth and they do not photobleach or blink. The upconversion produced by the nanoparticles can be tailored for NIR to NIR by carefully choosing the lanthanide dopants and dopant ratios such as KYb2F7: RE3+ (RE = Tm, Er). Spectroscopic characterization was done by analyzing absorption, fluorescence, and quantum yield data. In order to study the toxicity of the nanoparticles Monkey Retinal Endothelial Cells (MREC) were cultivated in 24 well plates and then treated with nanoparticles at different concentrations in triplicate to obtain the optimal concentration for in vivo experiments. It will be shown that these UCNPs do not elicit a strong toxic response such as quantum dots and some noble metal nanoparticles. 3-D optical slices of nanoparticle treated fibroblast cells were imaged using a confocal microscope where the nucleus and cytoplasm were stained with DAPI and Alexa Fluor respectively. These results presented support the initial assumption, which suggests that KYb2F7: RE3+ would be excellent candidates for NIR contrast agents.
ABSTRACT
There is increasing interest in rare earth (RE) doped nanoparticles (NPs) due to their sharp absorption and photoluminescence (PL) in the near infrared (NIR) spectral region. These NIR based nanoparticles (NPs) could allow biological imaging at substantial depths with enhanced contrast and high spatial resolution due to the absence of auto fluorescence in biological samples under infrared excitation. Here, we present the highly efficient infrared photoluminescence in GdF3:Nd(3+) nanoparticles under 800 nm excitation within the hydrodynamic size limitations for bio-applications. The downconversion (Stokes emission) absolute quantum yields (QY) in powder, polymaleic anhydride-alt-1-octadicene (PMAO) coated powder and colloidal solutions have been investigated. QY measurements have revealed that downconversion (Stokes emission) QYs of approximately 5 ± 2 nm sized GdF3:1% Nd(3+) colloidal NPs are 2000 times higher than those of efficient upconversion (UC) particles NaYF4:20% Er/2% Yb of the same size. Furthermore, the utility of these NIR emitting nanoparticles for bioimaging probes has been demonstrated by confocal imaging and spectroscopic study.