Enhancing ZnO nanowire gas sensors using Au/FeO hybrid nanoparticle decoration.

Heterojunctions are an important strategy for designing high performance electrical sensor materials and related devices. Herein, a new type of metal-semiconductor hybrid nanoparticle has been successfully used to remarkably sensitize the surface of ZnO nanowires for detecting NO with high responses over a broad temperature window ranging from room temperature to 600 °C. These hybrid nanoparticles are comprised of iron oxide nanowires with well dispersed single crystalline Au nanoparticles.

Tailoring Renal Clearance and Tumor Targeting of Ultrasmall Metal Nanoparticles with Particle Density.

Identifying key factors that govern the in vivo behavior of nanomaterials is critical to the clinical translation of nanomedicines. Overshadowed by size-, shape-, and surface-chemistry effects, the impact of the particle core density on clearance and tumor targeting of inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) remains largely unknown. By utilizing a class of ultrasmall metal NPs with the same size and surface chemistry but different densities, we found that the renal-clearance efficiency exponentially increased in the early elimination phase while passive tumor targeting linearly decreased with a decrease in particle density.

Luminescent Gold Nanoparticles with Size-Independent Emission.

Size-independent emission has been widely observed for ultrasmall thiolated gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) but our understanding of the photoluminescence mechanisms of noble metals on the nanoscale has remained limited. Herein, we report how the emission wavelength of a AuNP and the local binding geometry of a thiolate ligand (glutathione) on the AuNP are correlated, as these AuNPs emit at different wavelengths in spite of their identical size (ca. 2.

Labeling Monomeric Insulin with Renal-Clearable Luminescent Gold Nanoparticles.

In the native physiological environment, inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) often induce nonspecific protein adsorption, which could significantly alter the function of the proteins they labeled. As a result, small fluorescent dyes are still widely used in the imaging of proteins in animals due to their minimal interference with protein function. Here, we used monomeric insulin as a model and compared its bioactivity before and after labeling with renal-clearable near-infrared-emitting gold NPs.

Serum protein adsorption and excretion pathways of metal nanoparticles.

While the synthesis of metal nanoparticles (NPs) with fascinating optical and electronic properties have progressed dramatically and their potential biomedical applications were also well demonstrated in the past decade, translation of metal NPs into the clinical practice still remains a challenge due to their severe accumulation in the body. Herein, we give a brief review on size-dependent material properties of metal NPs and their potential biomedical applications, followed by a summary of how structural parameters such as size, shape and charge influence their interactions with serum protein adsorption, cellular uptake and excretion pathways. Finally, the future challenges in minimizing serum protein adsorption and expediting clinical translation of metal NPs were also discussed.

Glutathione-coated luminescent gold nanoparticles: a surface ligand for minimizing serum protein adsorption.

Ultrasmall glutathione-coated luminescent gold nanoparticles (GS-AuNPs) are known for their high resistance to serum protein adsorption. Our studies show that these NPs can serve as surface ligands to significantly enhance the physiological stability and lower the serum protein adsorption of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs), in addition to rendering the NPs the luminescence property. After the incorporation of GS-AuNPs onto the surface of SPIONs to form the hybrid nanoparticles (HBNPs), these SPIONs' protein adsorption was about 10-fold lower than those of the pure glutathione-coated SPIONs suggesting that GS-AuNPs are capable of providing a stealth effect against serum proteins.

Surface-chemistry effect on cellular response of luminescent plasmonic silver nanoparticles.

Cellular response of inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) is strongly dependent on their surface chemistry. By taking advantage of robust single-particle fluorescence and giant Raman enhancements of unique polycrystalline silver NPs (AgNPs), we quantitatively investigated effects of two well-known surface chemistries, passive PEGylation and active c-RGD peptide conjugation, on in vitro behaviors of AgNPs at high temporal and spatial resolution as well as chemical level using fluorescence and Raman microscopy. The results show that specific c-RGD peptide-αvβ3 integrin interactions not only induced endosome formation more rapidly, enhanced constrained diffusion, but also minimized nonspecific chemical interactions between the NPs and intracellular biomolecules than passive PEGylation chemistry; as a result, surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) signals of c-RGD peptides were well resolved inside endosomes in the live cells, while Raman signals of PEGylated AgNPs remained unresolvable due to interference of surrounding biomolecules, opening up an opportunity to investigate specific ligand-receptor interactions in real time at the chemical level.