Figure 1.
Transmission electron microscopy images of 70 nm bare upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs).
Figure 2.
Effects of different concentrations and sizes of UCNPs on PCR amplification specificity.
Three commercial real-time PCR master mixes were applied to determine the effects of different concentrations and sizes of UCNPs on the specificity of PCR amplification of a 120 bp 5S rDNA fragment from soybean genomic DNA, at an annealing temperature of 50°C. (A) AccuPower PCR PreMix with Top Polymerase (Bioneer). (B) AmpliTaq Gold 360 Master Mix with AmpliTaq Gold DNA Polymerase (Applied Biosystems). (C) HotStarTaq Plus Master Mix with HotStarTaq DNA Polymerase (Qiagen). Lane M: DNA marker; lane C: template without UCNPs; lanes 1∼5∶5, 7.5, 10, 15, and 30 nM of QDs, respectively; lanes 6∼8∶0.5, 0.75, and 1.0 µg/µL of 40-nm-sized UCNPs, respectively; lanes 9∼14∶1×( = 2.4×105 particles/µL), 10×, 15×, 20×, 25×, and 30× of 70-nm-sized UCNPs, respectively; lanes 15∼20∶1×, 10×, 15×, 20×, 25×, and 30× of 250-nm-sized UCNPs, respectively.
Table 1.
Effects of UCNPs on PCR amplification efficiency, using 3 commercial real-time PCR master mixes.
Figure 3.
Effects of different annealing temperatures on PCR amplification specificity.
A 120 bp 5S rDNA fragment from soybean genomic DNA was PCR-amplified with and without the use of a 40-nm-sized UCNP (1 µg/µL). Lane M: DNA marker; lanes 1, 2∶25°C; lanes 3, 4∶35°C; lanes 5, 6∶45°C; lanes 7, 8∶55°C; lanes 9, 10∶60°C. Lanes 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9 show the results of PCRs performed in the absence of UCNPs; lanes 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 show the results of PCRs performed in the presence of UCNPs (1 µg/µL).