Open AccessDevelopment and optimization of near-IR contrast agents for immune cell tracking
Author(s) -
Pratixa P. Joshi,
Soon Joon Yoon,
Yun Sheng Chen,
Stanislav Emelianov,
Konstantin Sokolov
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
biomedical optics express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.362
H-Index - 86
ISSN - 2156-7085
DOI - 10.1364/boe.4.002609
Subject(s) - photoacoustic imaging in biomedicine , photothermal therapy , materials science , nanorod , immune system , absorbance , nanotechnology , optical imaging , molecular imaging , contrast (vision) , in vivo , biomedical engineering , chemistry , medicine , optics , immunology , physics , microbiology and biotechnology , chromatography , biology
Gold nanorods (NRs) are attractive for in vivo imaging due to their high optical cross-sections and tunable absorbance. However, the feasibility of using NRs for cell tracking has not been fully explored. Here, we synthesized dye doped silica-coated NRs as multimodal contrast agents for imaging of macrophages - immune cells which play an important role in cancer and cardiovascular diseases. We showed the importance of silica coating in imaging of NR-labeled cells. Photoacoustic (PA) imaging of NRs labeled macrophages showed high sensitivity. Therefore, these results provide foundation for applications of silica-coated NRs and PA imaging in tracking of immune cells.