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Updated: Dec 12, 2025
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Localization and Relative Quantification of Carbon Nanotubes in Cells with Multispectral Imaging Flow Cytometry
Published on: December 12, 2013
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Rapid and sensitive quantification of cell-associated multi-walled carbon nanotubes
Lukas Steinmetz1, Joel Bourquin, Hana Barosova
1Adolphe Merkle Institute, University of Fribourg, Chemin des Verdiers 4, 1700 Fribourg, Switzerland. alke.fink@unifr.ch patricia.taladrizblanco@unifr.ch.
Nanoscale
|August 14, 2020
Summary
Lock-in thermography offers a non-destructive method to track nanomaterial uptake by cells. This technique efficiently analyzes gold nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes without labeling, aiding nanomedicine and safety assessments.
Area of Science:
- Biomedical Engineering
- Materials Science
- Cell Biology
Background:
- Assessing nanomaterial-cell interactions is crucial for nanomedicine, safe-by-design, and photothermal therapy.
- Conventional methods for nanomaterial analysis are often time-consuming, require complex sample preparation, or necessitate fluorescent labeling.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore lock-in thermography as a novel, non-destructive technique for analyzing nanomaterial-cell association.
- To compare the cellular uptake trends of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) in epithelial cells, mesothelial cells, and macrophages over 24 hours.
Main Methods:
- Utilized lock-in thermography to detect and quantify nanomaterials within cells.
- Confirmed nanomaterial presence using dark field and transmission electron microscopy.
- Validated lock-in thermography results for AuNPs against inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES).
Main Results:
- Lock-in thermography effectively analyzed nanomaterial association trends in different cell types.
- Results for gold nanoparticles showed good agreement between lock-in thermography and ICP-OES.
- Demonstrated straightforward, non-destructive detection and quantification of carbon nanotube-cell association without labeling.
Conclusions:
- Lock-in thermography is a viable, non-intrusive method for assessing nanomaterial-cell interactions.
- This thermographic approach provides a new pathway for quantifying carbon nanotubes within cellular environments.
- The technique supports advancements in in vitro nanomaterial safety and nanomedicine applications.
