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Highly efficient luminescent I-III-VI semiconductor nanoprobes based on template-synthesized CuInS2 nanocrystals

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Abstract

CuInS2 semiconductor nanocrystals (NCs) exhibit large absorption coefficient, size-dependent photoluminescence and low toxicity, making them excellent candidates in a variety of bioapplications. However, precise control of both their composition and morphology to improve the luminescent efficiency remains a great challenge via conventional direct synthesis. Herein, we present a novel low-temperature template synthesis of highly efficient luminescent CuInS2 nanoprobes from In2S3 NCs via a facile cation exchange strategy. The proposed strategy enables synthesis of a series of CuInS2 NCs with broad size tunability from 2.2 to 29.6 nm. Through rationally manipulating the stoichiometry of Cu/In, highly efficient luminescence of CuInS2 with the maximum quantum yield of 28.6% has been achieved, which is about one order of magnitude improvement relative to that of directly synthesized NCs. By virtue of the intense emission of CuInS2 nanoprobes, we exemplify their application in sensitive homogeneous biodetection for an important biomolecule of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) with the limit of detection down to 49.3 nM. Moreover, the CulnS2 nanoprobes are explored for ATP-targeted cancer cell imaging, thus revealing their great potentials in the field of cancer diagnosis and prognosis.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program of the CAS (No. XDB20000000), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. U1805252, 21771185, 21804134, 51672272, and 21771178), the CAS/SAFEA International Partnership Program for Creative Research Teams, and Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province (No. 2017I0018).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CAS Key Laboratory of Design and Assembly of Functional Nanostructures, and Fujian Key Laboratory of Nanomaterials, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, 350002, China

    Xian Li, Datao Tu, Shaohua Yu, Xiaorong Song, Wei Lian, Jiaojiao Wei, Xiaoying Shang, Renfu Li & Xueyuan Chen

  2. College of Chemistry and Materials Science, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou, 350007, China

    Xian Li, Datao Tu & Xueyuan Chen

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  1. Xian Li
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  8. Renfu Li
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Correspondence to Datao Tu or Xueyuan Chen.

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Li, X., Tu, D., Yu, S. et al. Highly efficient luminescent I-III-VI semiconductor nanoprobes based on template-synthesized CuInS2 nanocrystals. Nano Res. 12, 1804–1809 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-019-2435-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-019-2435-3

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