Dresden 2011 – scientific programme

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 29: Posters: Biopolymers \& Biomaterials

BP 29.24: Poster

Thursday, March 17, 2011, 17:15–20:00, P3

Single-walled carbon nanotubes as fluorescent probes — Alok Weßel, •Miquel Banchs Piqué, Nikta Fakhri, and Christoph Schmidt — III. Physikalisches Institut, Göttingen, Germany

Single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) have unique mechanical and optical properties. Typical SWNTs have a diameter of about 1 nm and a length on the order of microns. Depending on lattice structure SWNTs are conducting or semiconducting. Two-thirds of SWNT species have semiconducting properties. Individual and chemically intact SWNTs show band-gap fluorescence in the near-infrared (NIR) region between 900 to 1600 nm. The emission wavelengths are characteristic of their chirality and diameter. Since biomolecules and cells are relatively transparent in NIR range, the sharp spectra of SWNTs can be detected in complex biological media. We utilize the intrinsic near-infrared (NIR) fluorescence of water solublized SWNTs to image individual SWNTs and study their photostability i.e. resistance to photobleaching and lack of blinking.