Design of Raman active nanoparticles for SERS-based detection

Abstract

Timely detection of cardiac biomarkers is needed to diagnose acute myocardial infarction, implement the appropriate early treatment, and significantly reduce the chance of mortality. Ideally, for maximizing patient impact, a point of care device needs to be designed that is fast, sensitive, reliable, and small enough to be used in the ambulance and emergency department. Surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a sensitive optical technique that can potentially be used to quantify the cardiac biomarkers of interest. In this work, silver nanoparticles were functionalized with a Raman reporter molecule and human cardiac Troponin I (cTnI) as an essential component of binding assays. Aggregated nanoparticles with the Raman reporter molecules were encapsulated in a silica shell to form SERS hotspots. Besides having a specific Raman spectra and binding affinity to cardiac Troponin I antibodies, the nanoparticles were designed to exhibit stability by using silica and polyethylene glycol (PEG) as part of the bioconjugation strategy. The specific narrow peaks from the Raman reporter molecule SERS signal allow for potential multiplexing capabilities as different Raman reporter molecules can be used in functionalized nanoparticles with different cardiac biomarkers. The SERS spectrum of the functionalized nanoparticles was measured to assess its potential to be used in an assay.