Photon Upconversion Probes with Lanthanide Containing Biomolecules

Upconversion of near infra-red light to visible light mediated by lanthanide ions is rapidly emerging as an important phenomenon with many applications in biological sciences, including imaging and medicine, amongst others. Using a single or a combination of different metal ions, lanthanides are capable of converting near infra-red (nIR) light into visible light using low powered lasers and offer much promise over conventional light sources in imaging since biological tissue and materials are much more transparent to radiation in this optical window and the mechanism allows high resolution 3D images to be obtained. However, current upconverting systems are limited to solid-state materials, and are upconverting phosphors or are self assembled supramolecular discrete metal clusters that are kinetically labile and only operate in deuterated solvents. At the interface of chemistry, biology and physics, this project will involve fabrication of a range of biomolecules (proteins, enzymes, peptides) and mimics that are capable of coordinating one or several lanthanide ions in close proximity to one another or a nIR dye antenna to create a new class of upconverting molecule that operates in water for use in biological probe development, biosensing and imaging applications.
Specific aims of the project are:
To screen a variety of lanthanide and nIR dye systems for upconversion in small polyaminoacrboxylate molecules using statistical methods and then orthogonal protection synthetic methods
To synthesise/engineer suitable deuterated and non-deuterated peptides, enzymes and proteins incorporating metal specific binding domains and suitable acceptor FRET dyes beginning with Calmodulin and Lanmodulin
To characterise the photophysics of these systems using state of the art and time-dependent experiments
To test the potential of the synthesised upconverting biomolecules for biosensing and imaging applications