Ag@poly(m-phenylenediamine) core-shell nanoparticles for highly selective, multiplex nucleic acid detection.

In this letter, we report on the one-step synthesis of Ag@poly(m-phenylenediamine) core-shell nanoparticles (APCSNPs), carried out by direct mixing of aqueous silver nitrate and m-phenylenediamine solutions at room temperature. We further demonstrate the use of APCSNP as a novel fluorescent sensing platform for nucleic acid detection. In this regard, the detection of DNA is accomplished in two steps. First, APCSNP absorbs and quenches the fluorescence of dye-labeled single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) as a probe. Second, hybridizing of the probe with its target produces a double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) that detaches from APCSNP, resulting in the recovery of dye fluorescence. It suggests that this sensing system has a high selectivity down to single-base mismatch, and the results exhibit good reproducibility. Furthermore, we also demonstrate its application for the multiplex detection of nucleic acid sequences.