Web Release Date: April 23,
Conjugation of DNA to Silanized Colloidal Semiconductor Nanocrystalline Quantum Dots
and
Materials Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California, Department of Chemistry, University of California, Berkeley, California, Institut fuer Angewandte Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, München, Germany, and Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of California, Berkeley, California
Received September 12, 2001
Revised Manuscript Received February 22, 2002
Abstract:
Water-soluble, highly fluorescent, silanized semiconductor nanocrystals with different surface charges were synthesized. To covalently attach the nanocrystals to biological macromolecules with a variety of mild coupling chemistries, the outermost siloxane shells were derivatized with thiol, amino, or carboxyl functional groups. Single- or double-stranded DNA was coupled to the nanocrystal surfaces by using commercially available bifunctional cross-linker. Conjugation had little effect on the optical properties of the nanocrystals, and the resulting conjugates were more stable than previously reported systems. By using the strategies developed in this study, most biomolecules can be covalently coupled to semiconductor nanocrystals. These nanocrystal-DNA conjugates promise to be a versatile tool for fluorescence imaging and probing of biological systems.
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