Fluorescence quenching of uranine on confeito-like Au nanoparticles

Effect of structure and size of Au nanoparticles (AuNPs) on fluorescence behavior of uranine was examined. Confeito-like AuNPs with different sizes (30 nm, 60 nm and 100 nm, respectively) had plasmon absorption bands at 555, 600 and 660 nm, while the band of spherical AuNP (20 nm in size) was at 525 nm. Fluorescence of uranine was significantly quenched by the small and medium confeito-like AuNPs, and the quenching effect by the large particle was less. In comparison, the spherical AuNP quenched more remarkable than the confeito-like AuNPs. A mechanism of resonance energy transfer from uranine to AuNPs via the surface plasmon was suggested, and the strong quenching effect of the small AuNPs could be explained by the energy transfer from adsorbed uranine molecules to AuNPs. These behaviors indicate that the large confeito-like AuNPs can be a preferable nano-probe and useful for plasmonic devices, which can tune or maintain the fluorescence properties of other markers.