Development of a visible-light-sensitized THA-based lanthanide nanocomposite for cell imaging

作者:Wang Yuan; Chang Huiqin; Jia Lei*; Zhu Taofeng; Xu Zhouqing; Zhou Tao; Li Huijun; Li Zhongyue; Xu Jun
来源:Materials Letters, 2015, 161: 644-647.
DOI:10.1016/j.matlet2015.09.073

摘要

As is well-known, hydroxyapatite (HA, Ca-10(PO4)(6)(OH)(2)) is a typical green natural material. Due to its good biodegradability and nontoxic properties, it is promising to act as a carrier of luminescent lanthanide complexes for the further applications. In this work, we synthesize the well-dispersed HA nanoparticles (NPs) by using SiO2 as templates (THA), which is subsequently grafted by a terpyridine derivative. Then, lanthanide europium complex Eu(DBM)(3)(H2O)(2) (HDBM = dibenzoylmethane) is employed to covalently couple with modified THA NPs via ligand exchange reaction, generating a novel THA-based ternary europium nanocomposite. The formed nanocomposite has well dispersion stability and high biocompatibility. Furthermore, THA-based lanthanide nanocomposite exhibits the visible-light excitable feature with a wide excitation wavelength range from UV to visible light (a maximum at 397 nm), long luminescence lifetime (303 mu s) and improved exposure durability. The excellent fluorescence and low cytotoxicity in cell study of the nanocomposite may result in the potential applications of cell imaging in biological systems.