Studies on Carbon Quantum Dots with Special Luminescent Properties and Their Capability of Overcoming the Biological Barriers
Abstract
Carbon dot (CD) is a recently discovered fluorescent nanoparticle that exhibits excellent optical properties while also displaying great biocompatibility. This thesis examines two applications of CD: development of self-illuminating CD and investigation of the ability of CD in crossing biological barriers.
The self-illumination of CD is achieved through bioluminescence resonance energy transfer (BRET) from a bioluminescent protein, Renilla luciferase, to CD. The synthesis of self-illuminating CD consisted of using N’-(3-dimethylamnopropyl)-N-ethylcarbodiimide as coupler with 0.20 mg/mL to 0.80 mg/mL of CD and incubating with 2 uM Rluc for 6.5 hours. The BRET efficiency increased with increasing CD concentration.
Bovine blood retina barrier (BRB), was used a biological barrier model. CD was incubated inside the eye after the removal of the vitreous. Preliminary data suggests that CD can cross the BRB as CD was found in the retinal neural layer of BRB as well as the choroid layer of BRB after treatment.