Highly Luminescent Heterostructured Copper‐Doped Zinc Sulfide Nanocrystals for Application in Cancer Cell Labeling |
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| Authors: | Huixiang Ang Dr Michel Bosman Dr Ramesh Thamankar Muhammad Faizal B Zulkifli Dr Swee Kuan Yen Anushya Hariharan Dr Thankiah Sudhaharan Dr Subramanian Tamil Selvan |
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| Institution: | 1. Institute of Materials Research and Engineering, Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), Singapore, Singapore;2. Neural Stem Cell Group, Institute of Medical Biology, Singapore, Singapore |
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| Abstract: | The structural characteristics of the seed‐mediated synthesis of heterostructured CuS–ZnS nanocrystals (NCs) and Cu‐doped ZnS (ZnS:Cu) NCs synthesized by two different protocols are compared and analyzed. At high Cu dopant concentrations, segregated subclusters of ZnS and CuS are observed. The photoluminescence quantum yield of ZnS:Cu NCs is about 50–80 %; a value much higher than that of ZnS NCs (6 %). Finally, these NCs are coated with a thin silica shell by using (3‐mercaptopropyl)triethoxysilane in a reverse microemulsion to make them water soluble. Cytotoxicity experiments show that these silica‐coated NCs have greatly reduced toxicity on both cancerous HeLa and noncancerous Chinese hamster ovary cells. The labeling of cancerous HeLa cells is also demonstrated. |
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| Keywords: | cancer cytotoxicity doping luminescence nanoparticles |
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