Gold Innovations Blog

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are truly extraordinary materials. Many of you reading this will already know a fair bit about them I’m sure, but for those that don’t I suggest you take a quick look at this page which summarises their uses and potential well. There have, however, always been concerns about potential toxicity of these nanomaterials – because of their diminutive size, CNTs have been shown to be able to accumulate in cells, eventually leading to cell death.

This is clearly a significant issue for utilising CNTs in certain fields. One such field in molecular therapeutics and imaging – indeed CNTs have been shown to hold great promise as contrast agents for photoacoustic detection and photothermal killing of individual bacteria in blood system. However, they were never fully developed as such because of the ongoing concerns around toxicity…

It’s for this reason I was impressed by this recent publication in Nature Nanotechnology. The team, led by Jin-Woo Kim and Vladimir Zharov of the University of Arkansas, have addressed this problem by depositing a thin layer of gold around the carbon nanotubes. The gold layer enhanced absorption of laser radiation and reduced toxicity. In vitro tests showed only minimal toxicity associated with the golden nanotubes. Compared to existing nanoparticles, the golden nanotubes also exhibited high laser absorption at a miniscule diameter. The golden nanotubes required extremely low laser-energy levels for detection, and low concentrations were required for effective diagnostic and therapeutic applications.

For more information see the University of Arkansas press release