Microwave synthesis of nearly monodisperse core/multishell quantum dots with cell imaging applications

We report in this article the microwave synthesis of relatively monodisperse, highly crystalline CdSe quantum dots (QDs) overcoated with Cd _0.5Zn _0.5S/ZnS multishells. The as-prepared QDs exhibited narrow photoluminescence bandwidth as the consequence of homogeneous size distribution and uniform crystallinity, which was confirmed by transmission electron microscopy. A high photoluminescence quantum yield up to 80% was measured for the core/multishell nanocrystals. Finally, the resulting CdSe/Cd _0.5Zn _0.5S/ZnS core/multishell QDs have been successfully applied to the labeling and imaging of breast cancer cells (SK-BR3).