Traditional acupuncture and moxibustion has a long history. It is a feature and advantage of China's medical science and has a positive impact on the development of the world's medicine. However, acupuncture does not give a clear modern scientific basis. The mechanism of acupuncture is not clear, which is largely limited. The development and promotion of acupuncture and moxibustion is also the main reason why acupuncture has not been widely recognized and accepted at home and abroad.
In recent years, SERS technology has been drawing attention due to its non-destructive, high-sensitivity fingerprint recognition detection. It has been widely used in various basic research fields. Yang Liangbao's team has been pondering whether the traditional acupuncture mechanism can be studied using SERS technology.
Inspired by traditional acupuncture and silver needles, the researchers modified PVP (polyvinylpyrrolidone)-coated gold nanoparticles on the surface of acupuncture silver needles to create a 'pluggable' SERS sensor. As a binder, PVP can directly The gold nanoparticles are modified on the silver needles, and because of the steric hindrance of the PVP on the surface of the gold nanoparticles, the gold nanoparticles on the surface of the silver needle tend to be densely packed, which helps to form more 'hot spots' to improve Pluggable 'SERS sensor sensitivity.
Yang Liangbao told the "China Science Journal" reporter: 'Compared with the traditional SERS sensor, the 'pluggable' SERS sensor is more likely to reach the inside of the sample, through the point of the needle surface detection at different locations, you can obtain different depth of the sample information. '
Researchers placed the 'pluggable' SERS sensor in a water-oil two-phase system. The point-of-use detection was performed in both the aqueous and oil phases to obtain molecular information in different phases. Yang Liangbao said: 'This kind of pluggable' can be inserted. The SERS sensor is expected to be used for biological living samples, especially for the traditional acupuncture mechanism.