Synthesis and characterization of CdTe nanocrystals for applications as biolabels

摘要

Semiconductor nanocrystals composed by few hundred to a few thousand atoms also known as quantum dots have received substantial attention due to their size tunable narrow-emission spectra and several other advantages over organic molecules as fluorescent labels for biological applications, including resistence to photodegradation, improved brightness and only one laser excitation that enable the monitoring of several processes simultaneously. In this work we have synthesized and characterized thiol-capped CdTe and bioconjugated them to macrophages. We have mapped the fluorescence intensity along the macrophage's body in our set up consisting of an optical tweezer plus a non-linear micro-spectroscopy system to perform scanning microscopy and observe spectra using two photon excited luminescence.