Fluorescent sp3 Defect-Tailored Carbon Nanotubes Enable NIR-II Single Particle Imaging in Live Brain Slices at Ultra-Low Excitation Doses
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Abstract
Cellular and tissue imaging in the second near-infrared window (NIR-II, ~1000–1350 nm) is advantageous for in vivo studies because of low light extinction by biological constituents at these wavelengths. However, deep tissue imaging at the single molecule sensitivity has not been achieved in the NIR-II window due to lack of suitable bio-probes. Single-walled carbon nanotubes have emerged as promising near-infrared luminescent molecular bio-probes; yet, their inefficient photoluminescence (quantum yield ~1%) drives requirements for sizeable excitation doses (~1–10 kW/cm 2 ) that are significantly blue-shifted from the NIR-II region (<850 nm) and may thus ultimately compromise live tissue. Here, we show that single nanotube imaging can be achieved in live brain tissue using ultralow excitation doses (~0.1 kW/cm 2 ), an order of magnitude lower than those currently used. To accomplish this, we synthesized fluorescent sp 3 -defect tailored (6,5) carbon nanotubes which, when excited at their first order excitonic transition (~985 nm) fluoresce brightly at ~1160 nm. The biocompatibility of these functionalized nanotubes, which are wrapped by encapsulation agent (phospholipid-polyethylene glycol), is demonstrated using standard cytotoxicity assays. Single molecule photophysical studies of these biocompatible nanotubes allowed us to identify the optimal luminescence properties in the context of biological imaging.
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The brightness of SWNTs was improved by the introduction of sp3 defects, which enabled single SWNT imaging with high signal-to-noise ratios using unprecedentedly low excitation intensities (100 W cm-2), an order of magnitude lower than previously reported.
“The brightness of SWNTs was improved by the introduction of sp3 defects, which enabled single SWNT imaging with high signal-to-noise ratios using unprecedentedly low excitation intensities (100 W cm–2), an order of magnitude lower than previously reported.205”
From The Pursuit of Shortwave Infrared-Emitting Nanoparticles with Bright Fluorescence through Molecular Design and Excited-State Engineering of Molecular Aggregates (2022) · cites this paper as [205]
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- Authors
- Mandal, A. K., Wu, X., Ferreira, J. S., Kim, M., Powell, L. R., Kwon, H., Groc, L., Wang, Y., & Cognet, L.
- Affiliations
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- University of Maryland, College Park (US)
- Corresponding author
- Cognet, Laurent
- ORCID
- Venue
- Scientific Reports
- Published
- 2020-03-24
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 5286-5286
- ISSN
- 2045-2322 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC7093457
- OpenAlex
- W3013539402
- Cited by
- 85
- References
- 48
- Citations by year
- 2026: 7 · 2025: 17 · 2024: 15 · 2023: 16 · 2022: 10 · 2021: 16 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 1
- FWCI
- 4.38
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Locations
- Scientific Reports (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- HAL (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Oskar-Bordeaux (Universite de Bordeaux) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR-14-OHRI-0001-01, ANR- 15-CE16-0004-03)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Materials Chemistry › Carbon and Quantum Dots Applications
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Biomedical Engineering › Nanoplatforms for cancer theranostics
- Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Materials Chemistry › Carbon Nanotubes in Composites
- Keywords
- single-walled carbon nanotubes, sp3 defects, NIR-II fluorescence, single-particle imaging, single-molecule imaging, nanotube functionalization, excitonic transitions, deep tissue imaging, photoluminescence
- MeSH terms
- Single Molecule Imaging, Animals, Brain, Fluorescence, Fluorescent Dyes, HeLa Cells, Humans, Rats, Sprague-Dawley, Spectroscopy, Near-Infrared, Nanotubes, Carbon, Rats
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