Preparation of novel magnetic fluorescent nanoparticles using amino acids

Nanotechnology has opened new gates to pharmaceutical sciences and medicine from the aspect of drug delivery and imaging systems. Currently, bimodal fluorescent-magnetic nanoparticles are of great interest to biomedical scientists. In order to constructing these kinds of nanoparticles, fluorescent molecules should be linked to a magnetic core, while luminescence quenching is prevented. In order to alleviate this effect, usually fluorescent molecules are attached to a magnetic core after a multistep hydrocarbon, polymer or silica coating, which significantly increases the particle's size and reduces its magnetic saturation value. In this study, for the first time, amino acids (l-lysine and l-arginine) have been used as a linker and spacer between a fluorescent molecule (FITC) and a magnetic nanoparticle (Fe3O4) in a simple, two-step synthesis. Also, 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane (APTES) was used without any previous silica coating for fluorescent magnetic nanoparticles construction. Routinely APTES is used after silica coating by tetraethoxysilane (TEOS). Either of l-lysine, l-arginine and APTES coating provides surface functional groups which interact with the isothiocyanate group of FITC. According to the obtained results, amino acids could be used for successful construction of fluorescent magnetic nanoparticles in a simple synthesis pathway, without any significant impact on the excitation and emission properties of fluorescent molecule.