Luminescent gold nanoclusters for bioimaging applications

Luminescent nanomaterials have emerged as attractive candidates for sensing, catalysis and bioimaging applications in recent years. For practical use in bioimaging, nanomaterials with high photoluminescence, quantum yield, photostability and large Stokes shifts are needed. While offering high photoluminescence and quantum yield, semiconductor quantum dots suffer from toxicity and are susceptible to oxidation. In this context, atomically precise gold nanoclusters protected by thiol monolayers have emerged as a new class of luminescent nanomaterials. Low toxicity, bioavailability, photostability as well as tunable size, composition, and optoelectronic properties make them suitable for bioimaging and biosensing applications. In this review, an overview of the sensing of pathogens, and of in vitro and in vivo bioimaging using luminescent gold nanoclusters along with the limitations with selected examples are discussed.

Luminescent gold nanoclusters for in vivo tumor imaging

This review highlights the pharmacokinetic features and tumor imaging preponderance of renal clearable AuNCs for in vivo tumor imaging.

Strategies of Luminescent Gold Nanoclusters for Chemo-/Bio-Sensing

Recent booming advances in luminescent gold nanoclusters (AuNCs), have prompted the development of novel fluorescent sensors. The luminescent AuNCs possess unique and intriguing physical and chemical properties including responsive photoluminescence and peroxide-like activity, providing abundant potentials for sensing strategy design. As of now, a wide variety of chem-/bio-sensors based on AuNCs have been developed and reviewed according to varied analytes. In this review, from a different point of view, we follow the route of how those sensors realize their functions and focus on the actual roles AuNCs play, in order to hierarchically and logically display the recent progress in the sensing applications of AuNCs. This review not only opens new windows to understand the development of sensors based on AuNCs but can also inspire broader and deeper utilization of luminescent nanomaterials.