Nanoparticle embedding method created

Tools such as ‘smart display’ 3D glasses or remote radiation sensors could be more easily created after a recent breakthrough allows light-emitting nanoparticles to be embedded in glass.

The ‘hybrid glass’ combines the properties of the luminescent nanoparticles with the transparency and ability of glass to be moulded into different shapes depending on the purpose, for example, very thin optical fibres. Before this technique had been created, nanoparticles had to be grown in situ in glass.

Dr Tim Zhao, lead author from the University of Adelaide, said: “These novel luminescent nanoparticles, called upconversion nanoparticles, have become promising candidates for a whole variety of ultra-high tech applications such as biological sensing, biomedical imaging and 3D volumetric displays."

Currently, neuroscientists use dye injections and lasers to guide a glass pipette in the brain to sites of interest. If fluorescent nanoparticles were embedded in a glass pipette, its light would allow neuroscientists to navigate through the brain.

The researchers believe other nanoparticles with different photonic, electronic and magnetic properties could be infused into glass. Dr Zhao said: "If we infuse glass with a nanoparticle that is sensitive to radiation and then draw that hybrid glass into a fibre, we could have a remote sensor suitable for nuclear facilities.”

Professor Heike Ebendorff-Heideprem, Deputy Director of the Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing at Adelaide University, said: “We have been able to keep the nanoparticles intact and well dispersed throughout the glass. The nanoparticles remain functional and the glass transparency is still very close to its original quality.”

The research was published in Advanced Optical Materials.