{"title":"A Method to Improve the Up-Conversion Fluorescence of Polymer Modified NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) Nanocomposites","authors":"Weina Cui, Si-yu Ni, Shunan Shan, Xingping Zhou","doi":"10.4236/WJNSE.2012.22007","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The modification of NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) nanoparticles synthesized in the presence of an ionic surfactant is critical to their application in biological fields for better solubility and biocompatibility. In this work, NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) was transformed from insoluble, inactive to hydrophilic, biocompatible via ligand exchange modification with polyacrylic acid (PAA). Ligand exchange was carried out at room temperature when a colloidal solution of NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) in tetrahydrofuran (THF) was treated with excess PAA. The PAA modified NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) nanoparticles got better surface properties but with declined inner up-conversion fluorescence. Generally, coating an analogous layer of material outside the core nanoparticles can improve the optical properties of the core. Accordingly, NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm)/NaYF4 nanoparticles were synthesized before PAA modification to avoid the optical intensity decaying. The result of fluorescence test proved that the water soluble NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm)/NaYF4/PAA nanocomposites had a sound up-conversion property compared with that of NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm)/PAA. Furthermore, the up-conversion fluorescence property of the nanocomposite varied with the doping ratio of Er(Tm) to Yb and the possible mechanism for this change was also discussed.","PeriodicalId":66816,"journal":{"name":"纳米科学与工程(英文)","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2012-06-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"2","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"纳米科学与工程(英文)","FirstCategoryId":"1089","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.4236/WJNSE.2012.22007","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 2
Abstract
The modification of NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) nanoparticles synthesized in the presence of an ionic surfactant is critical to their application in biological fields for better solubility and biocompatibility. In this work, NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) was transformed from insoluble, inactive to hydrophilic, biocompatible via ligand exchange modification with polyacrylic acid (PAA). Ligand exchange was carried out at room temperature when a colloidal solution of NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) in tetrahydrofuran (THF) was treated with excess PAA. The PAA modified NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm) nanoparticles got better surface properties but with declined inner up-conversion fluorescence. Generally, coating an analogous layer of material outside the core nanoparticles can improve the optical properties of the core. Accordingly, NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm)/NaYF4 nanoparticles were synthesized before PAA modification to avoid the optical intensity decaying. The result of fluorescence test proved that the water soluble NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm)/NaYF4/PAA nanocomposites had a sound up-conversion property compared with that of NaYF4:Yb,Er(Tm)/PAA. Furthermore, the up-conversion fluorescence property of the nanocomposite varied with the doping ratio of Er(Tm) to Yb and the possible mechanism for this change was also discussed.