Preparation, Characteristics and Cell Imaging of Fluorescent Nanoparticles Based on Grafted Poly(acrylic acid) / 分析化学

ABSTRACT

Polyacrylic acid was firstly grafted by N-amino-4-N-methylpiperazine-1,8-naphthlimide (AMN) to prepare a amphiphilic polymer, which was self-assembled in water producing nanoparticles called as PAAMN.Then the morphology, structure and fluorescence properties of PAAMN were investigated by various methods including transmission electron microscopy, dynamic light scattering, ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy (UV-Vis), nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (HNMR) and fluorescence spectroscopy.MTT assay was carried out to assess the cell compatibility of PAAMN.Finally, the fluorescence from PAAMN self and HeLa cells incubated with PAAMN was observed by fluorescence microscope.The results revealed that PAAMN had spherical structure, in which naphthlimide fluorphores were immobilized in the polyacrylic acid matrix with the degree of substitution of 4.1%.Under the physiological pH condition, PAAMN excited at 390 nm could emit strong and stable fluorescence at 534 nm.In the range of pH 4.0-10.0, its excitation and emission wavelengths had no obvious change.The fluorescence intensity of PAAMN increased with the decrease of pH values, but the pH sensitivity of PAAMN was much lower than that of AMN.PAAMN had good cell compatibility.From the pictures of fluorescence imaging, it was found that both PAAMN self and cells-engulfed PAAMN could emit green fluorescence upon excited at 390 nm, indicating the potential of the developed nanoparticle for cell imaging.