Beaming New Light On Life: From Beetles To Aircraft, Nanoparticles Aid Microscope Views

University of Utah physicists and chemists developed a new method tha...

University of Utah physicists and chemists developed a new method that uses a mirror of tiny silver "nanoparticles" so microscopes can reveal the internal structure of nearly opaque biological materials like bone, tumor cells and the iridescent green scales of the so-called "photonic beetle.The method also might be used for detecting fatigue in materials such as carbon-fiber plastics used to build the latest generation of aircraft fuselages, tails and wings, says John Lupton, an associate professor of physics and leader of the new study.The study will be published online Feb. 5 and in the March 2009 issue of Nano Letters, the leading nanoscience journal of the American Chemical Society. Nanoscience is the study of ultrasmall materials, structures or devices on a molecular or atomic scale.Lupton conducted the new study with Michael Bartl, an assistant professor of chemistry; Debansu Chaudhuri, a postdoctoral researcher in physics; and graduate students Jeremy Galusha in chemistry and Manfred Walter and Nicholas Borys in physics.From the invention of the optical microscope in the 17th century, microscopy has grown to the point where there are scores of different methods available.In an optical microscope, white light is passed through a specimen to view it. But the method is limited in how much detail and contrast can be seen within the specimen.Electron microscopes can view tiny structures, but they are expensive, not always readily available and cannot be used on all types of samples, Lupton says.A widely used method is known as laser or fluorescence microscopy, in which a laser is used to make a specimen emit light, either because the specimen does so naturally or because it has been injected or "labeled" with fluorescent dye. The trouble is that such dyes – when excited by laser light – generate toxic chemicals that kill living cells."It would be much better to place the cell, without any labels, on top of metal nanoparticles and measure the transmission of light," Lupton says.The new method developed by Lupton and colleagues is a variation of fluorescence microscopy, but involves using an infrared laser to excite clusters of silver nanoparticles placed below the sample being studied. The particles form "plasmonic hotspots," which act as beacons, shooting intensely focused white light upward through the overlying sample.The spectrum or colors of transmitted light reveal information about the composition and structure of the substance examined.