"A quantum dot is highly sensitive to the distance between it and the gold, as well as the size, number and arrangement of the gold particles," says Liddle, a scientist with the NIST Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology. "These factors can boost its fluorescence, mask it or change how long its glow lasts. We wanted a way to measure these effects, which had never been done before."
Liddle and his colleagues made several groups of DNA rectangles, each with a different configuration of quantum dots and gold particles in a solution. Using a laser as a spotlight, the team was able to follow the movement of individual DNA rectangles in the liquid, and also could detect changes in the fluorescent lifetime of the quantum dots when they were close to gold particles of different sizes. They also showed that they could exactly predict the lifetime of the fluorescence of the quantum dot depending on the size of the nearby gold nanoparticles.
While their tracking technique was time consuming, Liddle says that the strength of their results will enable them to engineer the dots to have a specific desired lifetime. Moreover, the success of their tracking method could lead to better measurement methods.
"Our main goals for the future," he concludes, "are to build better nanoscale sensors using this approach and to develop the metrology necessary to measure their performance."
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| Contact: Chad Boutin boutin@nist.gov 301-975-4261 National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Source:Eurekalert |