Enhanced Photothermal and Photoacoustic Performance of Graphene Oxide in NIR-II Biowindow by Chemical Reduction

• Published in: Photonics Vol. 9; no. 1; p. 2
• Main Authors: Su, Xiaoye, Li, Liantong, Cui, Dandan, Fang, Wei, Shi, Yujiao
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 01.01.2022
• Subjects: Absorption; Acids; Blackbody; Carbon; Chemical reduction; Conjugation; enhanced performance; Experiments; Graphene; graphene oxide; Graphite; Lasers; Light therapy; Nanomaterials; Nanotechnology; Near infrared radiation; NIR-II biowindow; photoacoustic; photothermal; Ultrasonic transducers; United States > US
• ISSN: 2304-6732; 2304-6732
• DOI: 10.3390/photonics9010002

We report on a novel strategy for constructing graphene oxide nanomaterials with strongly enhanced photothermal (PT) and photoacoustic (PA) performance in the near-infrared (NIR)-II biowindow by chemical reduction. Optical spectra clearly reveal that obvious enhancement of optical absorption is observed in the whole NIR wideband from the NIR-I to NIR-II region for chemically reduced graphene oxide (CR-G) nanomaterials, which is mainly arising from the restoration of the electronic conjugation within the graphene oxide sheets and therefore inducing a black-body re-introduction effect of typical graphite-like materials. We experimentally synthesized CR-G samples with different degrees of reduction to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed strategy. Experimental results show that the PT performance of the CR-G samples is greatly improved owing to the absorption enhancement by chemical reduction in the NIR-II biowindow. Furthermore, both in vitro and in vivo PA imaging of the CR-G samples with different degrees of reduction are performed to demonstrate their enhanced NIR-II PA performances. This work provides a feasible guidance for the rational design of graphene oxide nanomaterials with great potential for PT and PA applications in the NIR-II biowindow by chemical reduction.