聚合物电解质包裹金核银壳纳米棒制备双模式光学细胞成像探针
摘要
A surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) and fluorescence dual-mode probe is presented for cell imaging. In the fabrication process of such a probe, SERS reporter molecules were first attached to the surfaces of the Au@Ag core-shell nanorods (Au@AgNRs) to generate SERS signals. Then, the SERS activated Au@Ag NRs were coated with polyelectrolytes (PEs) via the layer-by-layer deposition method. Finally, fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) was adsorbed onto the outmost polyelectrolyte layer to generate fluorescence signals. With the designed structure, the proposed probe was capable of generating both SERS and fluorescence signals for cell imaging. The experimental results showed that the Au@Ag NRs can provide excellent SERS enhancing effect, while the PEs layers can protect the fluorescence of FITC from being quenched by the Au@Ag NRs. Furthermore, the PEs layers provided the presented probe with a good biocompatibility. <italic>In vitro</italic> experiments demonstrated that both SERS and fluorescence images of the living cells can be obtained after being incubated with the probes for 2 h. This kind of dual-mode cell imaging probe has great potential in the design of a drug delivery or tumor targeting nano-system.