Analysis of protein coatings on gold nanoparticles by XPS and liquid-based particle sizing techniques

The precise use of nanoparticles in technological applications requires control over their surface properties. This implies the ability to quantitatively describe, for example, molecular coatings in terms of their thickness, areal mass, or number of molecules. Here, the authors describe two different approaches to the measurement of these parameters by using gold nanoparticles ranging in diameter from 10 to 80 nm and coated with three different proteins: immunoglobulin G, bovine serum albumin, and a peptide. One approach utilizes ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering, and differential centrifugal sedimentation to measure the protein shell refractive indices and thicknesses, from which the number of molecules in the protein shell can be derived. The other approach employs x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to measure the thickness of the dry molecular coatings and also to derive the number of molecules in the protein shell. The authors demonstrate that the two approaches, although very different, produce consistent measurement results. This finding is important to extend the quantitative analysis of nanoparticle molecular coatings to a wide range of materials.