Faculty Mentor(s)
Dr. Bruce Heyen
Project Type
Honors Program project
Scholarship Domain(s)
Scholarship of Discovery
Presentation Type
Presentation
Abstract
The formation of a fluorescent biosensor complex consisting of 5 nm diameter gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) and single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) was conducted using a low-cost, efficient binding method. Furthermore, we assessed the analytical potential for the complex to detect mercury ions (Hg2+) in an aqueous solution upon collection of UV-vis and fluorescence spectrometry data for the AuNP-ssDNA complex. We aimed to investigate this potential due to the possibility that the nanoparticles formed utilizing this method would produce nanoparticles of too small a size to result in detectable fluorescence, thus the complex synthesized from this specific method was qualitatively evaluated to determine if it consistently and reproducibly provides results that would be clearly indicative of the presence of Hg2+. We discovered that samples of the mercury-bound complex did not yield a consistent fluorescence quenching for the fluorescence peak observed, as the peak height possessed a high standard deviation for the relatively small mean intensity. In addition, the methods for confirming the formation of the complex itself were not successful in showing a clear result.
Permission Type
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Included in
Survey of the Performance of 5 nm Gold Nanoparticles Within an ssDNA-Stabilized Biosensor for the Detection of Hg2+
Reed 330
The formation of a fluorescent biosensor complex consisting of 5 nm diameter gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) and single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) was conducted using a low-cost, efficient binding method. Furthermore, we assessed the analytical potential for the complex to detect mercury ions (Hg2+) in an aqueous solution upon collection of UV-vis and fluorescence spectrometry data for the AuNP-ssDNA complex. We aimed to investigate this potential due to the possibility that the nanoparticles formed utilizing this method would produce nanoparticles of too small a size to result in detectable fluorescence, thus the complex synthesized from this specific method was qualitatively evaluated to determine if it consistently and reproducibly provides results that would be clearly indicative of the presence of Hg2+. We discovered that samples of the mercury-bound complex did not yield a consistent fluorescence quenching for the fluorescence peak observed, as the peak height possessed a high standard deviation for the relatively small mean intensity. In addition, the methods for confirming the formation of the complex itself were not successful in showing a clear result.