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Qdot® Nanocrystals

The vision of nanotechnology
Qdot® products combine the revolutionary fluorescence performance inherent in the nanocrystal structure with a highly customizable surface for directing the bioactivity of Qdot® nanocrystals or for conjugating them to a wide range of molecules of interest. Qdot® nanocrystals represent a truly enabling "nanotechnology"—the many benefits they bring to fluorescence methodology include:

Long-term photostability for live-cell imaging and dynamics studies
Fixability for follow-up immunofluorescence from in vivo studies
Archivability for permanent sample storage in pathology
Brilliant colors for simple, single-excitation source, multicolor analysis

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History of quantum dots

Experiments with nanocrystal semiconductor materials revealed solutions of strikingly different colors made from the same substance.

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Structure of a Qdot® nanocrystal

Fundamentally, Qdot® nanocrystals are fluorophores—substances that absorb photons of light, then re-emit photons at a different wavelength.

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Relative size and tunability of Qdot® nanocrystals.

There is a predictable relationship between the physical size of the quantum dot and the wavelength of emitted fluorescence. This property has been referred to as "tuneability", and is being widely exploited in the development of multicolor assays.

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