Inorganic colloidal nanoparticles are very small, nanoscale objects with inorganic cores that are dispersed in a solvent. Depending on the material they consist of, nanoparticles can possess a number of different properties such as high electron density and strong optical absorption (e.g. metal particles, in particular Au), photoluminescence in the form of fluorescence (semiconductor quantum dots, e.g. CdSe or CdTe) or phosphorescence (doped oxide materials, e.g. Y 2 O 3 ), or magnetic moment (e.g. iron oxide or cobalt nanoparticles). Prerequisite for every possible application is the proper surface functionalization of such nanoparticles, which determines their interaction with the environment. These interactions ultimately affect the colloidal stability of the particles, and may yield to a controlled assembly or to the delivery of nanoparticles to a target, e.g. by appropriate functional molecules on the particle surface. This work aims to review different strategies of surface modification and functionalization of inorganic colloidal nanoparticles with a special focus on the material systems gold and semiconductor nanoparticles, such as CdSe/ZnS. However, the discussed strategies are often of general nature and apply in the same way to nanoparticles of other materials.

This critical review gives a short overview of the widespread use of gold nanoparticles in biology. We have identified four classes of applications in which gold nanoparticles have been used so far: labelling, delivering, heating, and sensing. For each of these applications the underlying mechanisms and concepts, the specific features of the gold nanoparticles needed for this application, as well as several examples are described (142 references).

Chromatin profiling provides a versatile means to investigate functional genomic elements and their regulation. However, current methods yield ensemble profiles that are insensitive to cell-to-cell variation. Here we combine microfluidics, DNA barcoding and sequencing to collect chromatin data at single-cell resolution. We demonstrate the utility of the technology by assaying thousands of individual cells, and using the data to deconvolute a mixture of ES cells, fibroblasts and hematopoietic progenitors into high-quality chromatin state maps for each cell type. The data from each single cell is sparse, comprising on the order of 1000 unique reads. However, by assaying thousands of ES cells, we identify a spectrum of sub-populations defined by differences in chromatin signatures of pluripotency and differentiation priming. We corroborate these findings by comparison to orthogonal single-cell gene expression data. Our method for single-cell analysis reveals aspects of epigenetic heterogeneity not captured by transcriptional analysis alone.

Synthesis of ultrasmall water-soluble fluorescent gold nanoclusters is reported. The clusters have a decent quantum yield, high colloidal stability, and can be readily conjugated with biological molecules. Specific staining of cells and nonspecific uptake by living cells is demonstrated.

Amphiphilic polymer‐coating for nanoparticles: The facile one‐pot synthesis of a comblike polymer can be tailored in order to vary its hydrophobic side‐chains or to directly incorporate functional molecules without the need for crosslinkers. This leads to a general and robust method of phase‐transfer of hydrophobic nanoparticles to aqueous solution, as well as to their modification with functional molecules.

Superparamagnetic MnFe2O4 nanocrystals of different sizes were synthesized in high-boiling ether solvent and transferred into water using three different approaches. First, we applied a ligand exchange in order to form a water soluble polymer shell. Second, the particles were embedded into an amphiphilic polymer shell. Third, the nanoparticles were embedded into large micelles formed by lipids. Although all approaches lead to effective negative contrast enhancement, we observed significant differences concerning the magnitude of this effect. The transverse relaxivity, in particular r2*, is greatly higher for the micellar system compared to the polymer-coated particles using same-sized nanoparticles. We also observed an increase in transverse relaxivities with increasing particle size for the polymer-coated nanocrystals. The results are qualitatively compared with theoretical models describing the dependence of relaxivity on the size of magnetic spheres.

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Cell-generated mechanical forces play a critical role during tissue morphogenesis and organ formation in the embryo. However, little is known about how these forces shape embryonic organs, mainly because it has not been possible to measure cellular forces within developing three-dimensional (3D) tissues in vivo. Here we present a method to quantify cell-generated mechanical stresses that are exerted locally within living embryonic tissues using fluorescent, cell-sized, oil microdroplets with defined mechanical properties and coated with surface integrin or cadherin receptor ligands. After introducing a droplet between cells in a tissue, local stresses are determined from the droplet shape deformations, which are obtained via fluorescence microscopy and computerized image analysis. Using this method, we quantify the anisotropic stresses generated by mammary epithelial cells cultured within 3D aggregates and confirm that these stresses (3.4 nN/µm2) are dependent on myosin II activity and more than two-fold larger than the stresses generated by cells of embryonic tooth mesenchyme when analyzed within similar cultured aggregates or in developing whole mouse mandibles.