Non plasmonic semiconductor quantum SERS probe as a pathway for in vitro cancer detection.

ABSTRACT: Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS)-based cancer diagnostics is an important analytical tool in early detection of cancer. Current work in SERS focuses on plasmonic nanomaterials that suffer from coagulation, selectivity, and adverse biocompatibility when used in vitro, limiting this research to stand-alone biomolecule sensing. Here we introduce a label-free, biocompatible, ZnO-based, 3D semiconductor quantum probe as a pathway for in vitro diagnosis of cancer. By reducing size of the probes to quantum scale, we observed a unique phenomenon of exponential increase in the SERS enhancement up to ~10⁶ at nanomolar concentration. The quantum probes are decorated on a nano-dendrite platform functionalized for cell adhesion, proliferation, and label-free application. The quantum

SUBMITTER: Haldavnekar R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6076273 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature