A triantennary dendritic galactoside-capped nanohybrid with a ZnS/CdSe nanoparticle core as a hydrophilic, fluorescent, multivalent probe for metastatic lung cancer cells

A new tri-antennary, galactoside-capped gallamide dendritic anchor with thiolate focal group is synthesized via click chemistry. The highly hydrophilic dendron was efficiently anchored onto the surface of CdSe/ZnS core/shell nanoparticles in a covalent fashion, as evidenced by H-1 NMR spectrum of the resultant nanohybrid with intact core fluorescent property. The water-soluble nano-hybrid was found smoothly and selectively uptaken by lung cancer cells enriched with membrane-bound asialoprotein receptors in 2-3 h, as evidenced by confocal microscopic analysis. Furthermore, cancer cells that are undergoing active mitosis also tend to uptake the nanohybrids efficiently and remain sustainable in serum-containing medium for several days, which shed light on its application as a photodynamic drug carrier for apoptosis study.