In vivo functionalization of biosilica from Thalassiosira weissflogii with a two-photon red emitting fluorescent tag
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MRS Advances © 2018 Materials Research Society DOI: 10.1557/adv.2018.162
In vivo functionalization of biosilica from Thalassiosira weissflogii with a two-photon red emitting fluorescent tag Danilo Vona1, Gabriella Leone1,4, Marco Lo Presti1, Roberta Ragni1, Jonathan Daniel2, Mireille Blanchard-Desce2, Gianluca M. Farinola1 and Stefania R. Cicco3 1 Dipartimento di Chimica, Università degli Studi di Bari “Aldo Moro”. Via Orabona, 4, 70126 Bari, Italy. 2 CNR NANOTECH, Via Orabona, 4, 70126 Bari, Italy
2 Institut des Sciences Moléculaires (UMR 5255 CNRS), Université de Bordeaux, 33400 Talence, France
3 CNR ICCOM, Via Orabona, 4, 70126 Bari, Italy
4 IIT-CNST Via Giovanni Pascoli 30, 20133 Milan, Italy
ABSTRACT
The chemical decoration of biosilica shells (frustules) from microalgae with several classes of organic molecules is a convenient, scalable biotechnological route to silica nanostructures with applications ranging from photonics to biomedicine. Here we report for the first time the in vivo staining of Thalassiosira weissflogii diatoms with a two photon red emitting triphenylamine-based fluorescent dye bearing a triethoxysilyl functional group (tPhA-Silane). In vivo staining of the cells has been investigated with confocal microscopy and hybrid silica structures comprising the dye embedded into the biosilica have been isolated by proper protocols able to remove the organic protoplasm.
INTRODUCTION Mesoporous silica from microorganisms, especially from diatoms microalgae, has recently attracted scientific and technological interests with intriguing applications in photonics, catalysis, sensing [1,2], biomedicine [3-4] and drug delivery [5]. The possibility of easy large-scale production and the intrinsic reproducible regular architecture in the mesoscale range [6] make these natural silica nano- or microstructures a sustainable and cheap alternative to synthetic mesoporous silica. In this context, diatoms look particularly attractive since these algae can be easily farmed and they can be functionalized either in vivo (exploiting the natural synthetic process of biosilica production) or after removal of the biological matter by chemical decoration of the shells. Actually, diatoms are an amazing example of the ability of nature to provide living machinery forming three-dimensional (3-D) organic and inorganic nano- and
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micro-structures with such highly reproducible and complex hierarchical morphologies that man-made technologies cannot yet match [7]. These are specie-specific morphologies which endow silica shells with photonic properties, especially due to periodicity of the morphology and size hierarchy of the pores on the shells. For this reason, frustules can be viewed as natural micro lenses, optical filters, polarizers, waveguides, beam splitters, couplers and lase
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