Blood Compatibility Of Carbon Nanotubes And Synthesis Of Fluorescent Carbon Dots

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are recently receiving considerable attention in drug delivery ornucleic acid delivery, biomedical therapy, and pHoto acoustic molecular bio-imaging. Despitethese advances, carbon nanotubes may lead to coagulation, complement activity, bio-toxity andother unbiocompatibilities. Before these carbon nanotubes are used in clinic application, it ismeaningful to do systematic evaluation the bio-safety of carbon nanotube. We use carbonnanotubes as representation of nanotubes, doing surface modification with heparin and chitosan,to develop a series of whole evalution system on hemocompatibility of nanotubes, that is appliedto all the nanotube materials.Two facile methods are developed to synthesize fluorescent carbon dots with diameter of2-10nm. In the first method, a one-step synthesis method has been used for producing carbondots from furfuryl alcohol. The carbon dots have been demonstrated excitationwavelength-independent pHotoluminescence behavior while the excitation wavelength ischanged from360to410nm. The surface of the carbon dots is decorated with carboxylic acidand further functionalized with amine-PEG1500. While another method is used to synthesizefluorescent carbon dots by hydrothermal treatment of furfuryl alcohol in presence ofmonopotassium pHospHate. The fluorescency emission and particle size of carbon dots aretunableby adjusting the concentration of monopotassium pHospHate. The basic studies on thepHotoluminescence and formation mechanism of carbon dots using transmission electronmicroscopy, dynamic light scattering, Fourier transform infrared, fluorescent spectroscopy, UVspectroscopy is proposed.