Gold medical applications

There are very many papers in the literature that address some aspect of gold nanospheres. In particular, their plasmon response (see Section 7.3.1.1) has been well studied, as has their agglomeration [50-52] and the manner in which they can be assembled into highly ordered colloidal crystals [50, 53, 54]. The latter are interesting and will be further discussed in Section 7.3.8.2. Conjugation of gold nanospheres with proteins and antibodies, for use as a stain in microscopy [55] or possibly, in medical applications [23], is another rich field. 

The chemistry of gold is complex. Gold can exist in seven oxidation states -1,0, - -1, -1-2, +3, +4, and - -5. Apart fromAu in the colloidal and elemental forms, only Au+ and Au+ are known to form compounds that are stable in aqueous media and important in medical applications. The remaining oxidation states of -1, +2, +4, and +5 are not presently known to play a role in biochemical processes related to therapeutic uses of gold. Neither Au+ or Au+ forms a stable aquated ion ([Au(OH2)+ ] or [Au(OH2)4 ], respectively)... 

SPR is a unique property of plasmonic or noble metal nanoparticles such as gold nanoparticles. This unique property offers multimodalities for medical applications due to photon confinement to a small particle size and enhancing all radiative and nonradiative properties of the nanoparticles [77]. 

The use of optical radiation is perspective for remote control over the capsule shell permeability in chemical technology and medical applications. Optical radiation can be used for therapeutic and diagnostic applications together with adressable excitation of capsule shells. To achieve capsules sensitivity to the optical radiation, absorbing dyes are used as plasmon-resonant nanoparticles, nanoshells and nanorods of noble metals (silver, gold). 

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