Fluorescent Gold Nanoclusters for Biosensor and Bioimaging Application

Abstract

With the rapid development of materials technology, fluorescent gold nanoclusters (AuNCs) are emerging as novel functional materials for diagnostic applications including the detection of biomarkers and bioimaging due to the advantages of their ultra-small size, tunable emissions, size-dependent fluorescence and excellent biocompatibility. In this review, we introduced the synthetic methods, and physical and chemical properties of AuNCs. Subsequently, we described the AuNCs-based design strategies for the detection of biomarkers including small molecules, DNA and proteins. The applications of AuNCs for tumor imaging in vitro and in vivo were also presented. Finally, we discussed the challenges and potential solutions of AuNCs-based nanosensors.

Ligand exchange reactions on thiolate-protected gold nanoclusters

“…Fluorescent gold nanoclusters have been widely used for biological applications such as cell identication, to study interaction, differentiation, and tracking. 109,[142][143][144][145] Compared with the more traditional QDs, uorescent gold nanoclusters have decent quantum yield, excellent biocompatibility, good photostability, and lower cytotoxicity. The clusters had negligible inuence on the cell viability at the considered dose.…”

Fast Tunable Biological Fluorescence Detection Device with Integrable Liquid Crystal Filter

“…To detect biological samples with fluorescence efficiently and sensitively, several approaches based on liquid crystal tunable filter (LCTF), correlation spectrometer and spectrophotometer were put forward [16][17][18][19]. Among the various sensing modalities used in the development of biofluorescence spectrometric analysis methods, liquid crystal has been utilized for biofluorescence sensing with enormous potential due to its simple mechanism and wide field of view [20][21][22].…”

Fluorescent Labeling of Hyaluronic Acid-Chitosan Nanocarriers by Protein-Stabilized Gold Nanoclusters

“…Highly fluorescent gold nanoclusters (Au NCs) are widely used sub-nanometer sized objects in chemical and medical fields due to their numerous special characteristics [15,16]. Depending on their size/structure, the type of stabilizing (bio)ligands as well as their fabrication methods, several Au NCs with a wide range of properties, like tunable fluorescence in visible light and NIR region can be prepared [17][18][19][20].…”

“…Depending on their size/structure, the type of stabilizing (bio)ligands as well as their fabrication methods, several Au NCs with a wide range of properties, like tunable fluorescence in visible light and NIR region can be prepared [17][18][19][20]. There is a growing interest in these materials in biological applications like in analytical methods [17,[20][21][22] as well as in theranostics [11,14,16,17] and fluorescent labeling of cells and tissues [12,15,17,23,24]. In contrast to the previously mentioned organic dye molecules or the intensively studied quantum dots (QDs) these Au NCs possess less toxic feature and better photochemical stability as well.…”