Luminescent quantum dots for diagnostic and bioimaging applications

Breakthroughs in nanoscience and the development of high-quality, nanomaterial-based optical probes have fueled interest in the use of nanoparticles for a broad range of bioimaging and diagnostic applications such as ultrasensitive biomolecule detection [1-6], multicolor immunostaining [7-10], single-cell analysis [11,12], and in vivo molecular imaging [13-16]. In particular, semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) have been the subject of intense research for the past two decades due to their novel optical and electronic properties, including resistance to photobleaching, tunable emission wavelength, intense signal brightness, and the simultaneous excitation of multiple uorescence colors [17-19]. Pioneering work by Nie, Alivasatos, and their coworkers in 1998 to adapt high-quality QDs for use in aqueous environments has paved the way for the use of QDs as biological agents [17-21], and recent research has generated highly stable and monodispersed QDs with diverse surface chemistries and properties [22-24].