Quenching of Luminol Fluorescence at Nano-Bio Interface: Towards the Development of an Efficient Energy Transfer System.

Surface modified colloidal gold (Au) and silver (Ag) nanoparticles (NPs) were used as efficient quenchers of luminol (LH) fluorescence either in homogeneous aqueous medium or its noncovalent assembly with bovine serum albumin (BSA). The mechanism as well as the extent of fluorescence quenching was found to be strongly dependent on the nature of the nanoparticles. While simple static type fluorescence quenching mechanism was perceived with AuNP, a more complex protocol involving quenching sphere model was envisaged for AgNP quenching.