Graphene Oxide (GO) and its derivative have attracted great deal of attention to the biological community due to their low cytotoxicity. We have developed a facile route to covalently graft N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPAM) directly from the surface of exfoliated graphene oxide (GO) using free radical polymerization technique and different GO-PNIPAM (GPNM) hybrids by changing the weight ratio of the two are produced. The grafting of PNIPAM has been demonstrated by several techniques like NMR, Raman,XPS, FTIR spectroscopy and TEM, AFM microscopy. The GO-g-PNIPAM hybrid shows ~20 times increase of fluorescence property than GO in aqueous medium. The origin of FL property as well as gradual blue shift of emission peak in all the hybrids from that of GO, may be attributed due to the lowering of sp2 cluster domain size, defect level transition and structural changes, since it is well documented that both the structure and defects influence the electronic structure of nanomaterials, subsequently changing their optical properties appreciably. We have studied the bio-compatibility evolution as well as cell viability using one of the GPNM hybrid solutions with different concentrations by conventional MTT assay. We have also loaded hydrophobic and hydrophilic drug using this bio-compatible and nontoxic GPNM hybrid, which has been demonstrated by UV-vis and fluorescence spectroscopic study. The loaded drug can also be released from the hybrid based on their affinity to biomolecules like DNA, RNA and the release of drug can easily be monitored by optical measurement like fluorescence property. Thus as synthesized material can be used as an important biological probe as drug carrier which will pave a new way to release the loaded drug.

Graphene oxide polymer hybrid and functionalized graphene for biological applications

248th National Meeting (2014)

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