Non-invasive, Real-time Detection of Vascular Disorders in Mice using Bright SWIR-emitting Gold Nanoclusters and Monte Carlo Image Analysis

Abstract

We present here a new approach for non-invasive high resolution whole-body vascular imaging in depth by combining water-soluble and bright SWIR-emitting gold nanoclusters revealing an anisotropic surface charge with Monte Carlo image processing of the images. We applied and validated this approach to quantify vessel complexity in transgenic mice presenting vascular disorders.In vivo infrared imaging has experienced major breakthroughs over the past few years with potential applications in cancer and cardio-vascular diagnostics1. Hongjie Dai's team was among the first who developed emitters for the shortwave infrared region (SWIR, 900-1700 nm), also called NIR II. Due to the weak photon absorption, the low autofluorescence, and reduced scattering by tissues at these wavelengths compared to NIR I (700-900 nm) and the

Imaging‐Guided Antibacterial Based on Gold Nanocrystals and Assemblies

“…[53] Particularly, the luminescence of biocompatible Au NCs allows for the fluorescence imaging in biomedical applications. [54] Tremendous progress has been gradually made on the application of NIR-II emitting Au NCs in brain imaging, [55] tumor imaging, [56] vascular imaging, [57] bone imaging, [58] etc., demonstrating their great potential as a molecular probe for biological imaging, real-time monitoring of metabolism in vivo and disease diagnosis. However, the optical properties of most NIR-II emitting Au NCs are still unsatisfactory, with relatively low fluorescence quantum yield (QY) (generally less than 10%), poor luminescence stability and other problems, which severely limit their application in biological imaging and analysis.…”