Intraocular application of gold nanodisks optically tuned for optical coherence tomography: inhibitory effect on retinal neovascularization without unbearable toxicity

To design gold nanoparticles with high contrast in optical coherence tomography (OCT), shape, size and surface charge were considered. Gold nanodisks have higher scattering efficiencies and resonant wavelength can be modulated by changing size. Negative zeta potential of bare gold facilitates diffusion in the vitreous. As a result, 160-nm-sized bare gold nanodisks exhibiting resonant wavelength at 830 nm where the source of light utilized by OCT lies were fabricated. Intravitreally injected gold nanodisks showed strong signal intensity in in vivo OCT and could attenuate retinal neovascularization of oxygen-induced retinopathy mice. They were cleared by 2 weeks without any unbearable toxicity.174