Abstracts Book - IMRC 2018

• SB2-P014
DESIGN OF A NANOSCINTILLATOR COUPLED WITH
PROTOPORPHYRIN IX FOR ITS POTENTIAL APPLICATION IN
PHOTODYNAMIC THERAPY
Karelid Garcia Tapia 1 , Prakhar Sengar 2 , Kanchan Chauhan 3 , Akhil Jain 2 , Karla Oyuky Juarez
Moreno 3 , Hugo Alejandro Borbón Nuñez 2 , Gustavo Alonso Hirata 2
1
Centro de Investigación Científica y de Educación Superior de Ensenada (CICESE),
Fisicoquímica de nanomateriales, Mexico. 2 Centro de Nanociencias y Nanotecnología CNyN-
UNAM, Fisicoquímica de nanomateriales, Mexico. 3 Centro de Nanociencias y Nanotecnología
CNyN-UNAM, Bionanotecnología, Mexico.
The development of novel luminescent nanomaterials applied to photodynamic
therapy (PDT) has recently being a major area of research. The PDT, which is a
promising cancer treatment method has several limitations such as low
efficiency in treating large or deep tumors because photons cannot reach into
these tumors. X-rays are considered as a potential energy source to activate
photosensitizers located deeply in the body with the assistance of scintillating
nanoparticles. It is well known that YAG:Pr is an excellent scintillator. On the
other hand, it is reported that the photoactivation of ZnO nanoparticles gives
rise to the formation of biotoxic hydroxyl radicals, representing an advantage in
PDT, especially for the hypoxic tumor tissue. Also, protoporphyrin IX (PpIX) has
been widely employed because of its ability to generate singlet oxygen (), a main
cytotoxic agent for PDT. Moreover, the folic acid (FA) molecules facilitate the
targeting of the system to folate receptors on tumor cells. In this work, we report
the synthesis and characterization of YAG:Pr@ZnO@PpIX-FA, a novel
nanomaterial which possesses scintillating properties for applications in PDT.
This nanoscintillator was characterized by transmission electron microscopy
(TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), fluorescence spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron
spectroscopy (XPS), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and
cathodoluminescence. The TEM images for YAG:Pr@ZnO reveal spherical
morphology and a thin ZnO layer of about 7-10 nm. On the other hand, the FTIR
spectra show bands that can be assigned to characteristics vibrations of PpIX
and FA. After a systematical investigation of YAG:Pr@ZnO@PpIX-FA we can
establish that this system has an efficient fluorescence resonance energy
transfer (FRET) due to its good spectrum match between YAG:Pr@ZnO and PpIX.
Under UV irradiation, the generation of is enhanced by the YAG:Pr@ZnO@PpIX-
FA nanoscintillator and proved to produce cancer cell damage. It should be
mention that the addition of FA to this system has no effect on production.