Multicomponent nanoarchitectures for the design of optical sensing and diagnostic tools

Abstract

Simultaneous integration of multifunctional properties from different components into a hybrid nanostructure with hierarchical organization is attractive to construct new materials sought for diverse useful applications. This review highlights recent advances in the fabrication of multicomponent organicconjugated inorganic nanoarchitectures and their potential uses in optical sensing and diagnostic tools. The similarity of the particle sizes, between inorganic hybrids and biomolecules, is the reason they can integrate into new bioconjugated nanocomposites. These multifunctional properties enable such materials to function as dual diagnostic and therapeutic agents in imaging-guided therapy.Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)-templated replica approaches for fabricating DNA-functionalized plasmonic nanoarchitectures are discussed to show how incorporation of metal clusters onto helical DNA structures occurs. The resulting helix plasmonic assemblies response enhanced plasmonic properties and circular dichroism signals to external environments, means they can function as highly selective bioprobes. Nanocrystal superlattices are prepared by assembling the uniform colloids by guiding the external magnetic field and solvent evaporation. The highly organized superlattices with long-range ordering exhibit optical properties tuned by external stimuli and, consequently they can be useful for desirable optical sensors and photoswitchable patterns. The efforts discussed in this review are expected to present the structural diversity of promising multifunctional nanoarchitectures for the design of efficient optical sensing and diagnostic tools.

Surface assisted growth of CuSO4 micro- and nano- spheres

“…Under similar conditions, only micro-and nano-spheres of CuSO 4 were observed. Such phenomenon was not observed from solutions of other ethanol soluble salts, such as CuCl 2 , Cu(NO 3 ) 2 , Cu(OAc) 2 , FeCl 2 , FeCl 3 , NiCl 2 , CoCl 2 , NiSO 4 ( Figure 5).…”

“…A large quantity of the nano-/micro-spheres were found when the CuSO 4 Concentrations were between 1×10 -4 M and 1×10 -3 M (Figure 4b-e). When the CuSO 4 concentration was higher than 4×10 -3 M, larger crystals were formed ( Figure 4f).…”

“…It is likely that the OH groups on silicon (there is a naturally oxidized thin film of SiO 2 on silicon) or glass surfaces provided multiple nucleation sites for CuSO 4 to precipitate out of the solution, which assisted the formation of the spheres.…”

“…It is a hypothesis that the formation of amorphous CuSO 4 nano/microspheres may be due to relatively faster evaporation of ethanol than other solvents such as water, which resulted in differential stress and distribution of porosity Nanospheres and microspheres have been widely used in fields such as agriculture, medicine, manufacturing, environment, energy, and cosmetic industries. These micro-and nano-materials can be synthesized from a variety of methods including hydrothermal synthesis [1] attrition [2] pyrolysis [3] thermal plasma [4] inert-gas condensation [5] sol gel process [6] etc. The synthesized materials include metals, polymers, metal oxides, ceramics, and composites.…”

Hybrid phthalocyanine/lead sulphide nanocomposite for bistable memory switches

“…These materials exhibit significant promise for a variety of applications including sensors [3,4], displays [5,6], photovoltaics [7,8], photonic devices [9,10] and non-volatile memory devices [11,12]. The memory devices consist of single or triple active nanocomposite layers sandwiched between two terminals; single layer architecture is, however, considered to be suitable for high density data storage.…”