(Invited) Carbon Nanotube Photoluminescence for Cancer Research and Diagnosis

New technologies are needed for the early detection of cancer and the identification of therapeutic vulnerabilities in cancers. Our laboratory develops optical nanosensor technologies using carbon nanotubes, including sensors that identify disease fingerprints in serum, diagnostic implants to facilitate longitudinal detection of cancer biomarkers, and assays for cancer drug development. These methods employ the photoluminescence of single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNTs) and covalent sp3 quantum well defects on SWCNTs, aka organic color centers (OCCs), that introduce new chemical sensitivities. To introduce new detection technologies using OCC-modified SWCNTs, we developed new supramolecular functionalization methods, as well as new types of optical instrumentation to detect changes in near-infrared emission within biological and clinical samples. We harnessed OCC-modified SWCNTs for the detection of metabolic changes in live cells and tissues, disease biomarkers in situ via implants, and overall disease states, aided by machine learning processes.