Evidence-based toxicity of probes

Abstract

Quantum dots (QDs) have brighter and longer fluorescence than organic dyes. Therefore, QDs can be applied to biotechnology, and have capability to be applied to clinical technology. Currently, among the several types of QDs, CdSe with a ZnS shell is one of the most popular QDs to be used in biological experiments. However, when the CdSe-QDs were applied to clinical technology, potential toxicological problems of CdSe core should be considered. To overcome the problem, silicon nanocrystals, which have the potential of biocompatibility, could be a candidate of alternate probes.Silicon nanoparticles have been synthesized using several techniques. Recently, novel silicon nanoparticles were reported to be synthesized with the combination methods, radio frequency sputtering method and hydrofluoric-etching method In order to assess the biocompatibility of the Silicon nanoparticles, we performed two different cytotoxicity assays, cell viability/proliferation assay using the mitochondrial activity assay and cell membrane damage assay using the lactate dehydrogenase assay.At the 112 µ g/mL of silicon nanoparticles (the maximum concentration in this study), we could detected the cell membrane damage of HeLa cells and the decrease of hepatocytes viability. We concluded that we could use the silicon nanoparticles as bioimaging marker but the attention should be given when Silicon nanoparticles were applied to cells in high concentration.