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Monovalent, reduced-size quantum dots for imaging receptors on living cells

Howarth M, Liu W, Puthenveetil S, Zheng Y, Marshall LF, Schmidt MM, Wittrup KD, Bawendi MG et al.

Nature methods, 2008

Abstract

We describe a method to generate monovalent quantum dots (QDs) using agarose gel electrophoresis. We passivated QDs with a carboxy-terminated polyethylene-glycol ligand, yielding particles with half the diameter of commercial QDs, which we conjugated to a single copy of a high-affinity targeting moiety (monovalent streptavidin or antibody to carcinoembryonic antigen) to label cell-surface proteins. The small size improved access of QD-labeled glutamate receptors to neuronal synapses, and monovalency prevented EphA3 tyrosine kinase activation.

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