Background Suppression in Imaging Gold Nanorods through Detection of Anti-Stokes Emission

Metallic nanoparticles have opened the possibility of imaging, tracking, and manipulating biological samples without time limitations. Their low photoluminescence quantum yield, however, makes them hard to detect under high background conditions. In this study we show that it is possible to image gold nanorods by detecting their anti-Stokes emission under resonant excitation. We show that even in the membrane of a cell containing the fluorescent dye Atto 647N, the signal/background of the anti-Stokes emission can be >10, while it is impossible to image the particles with the Stokes emission. The main advantage of this technique is that it does not require any major change in existing fluorescence imaging setups, only the addition of an appropriate short-pass filter in the detection path.