Monodisperse mesoporous silica nanospheres with radially oriented mesochannels and their size effect on cell uptake

•We synthesized a series of monodisperse silica nanospheres with unique radially aligned mesopores for the first time.•We investigated the size-dependent of cellular uptake of the unique MSNs.•We studied the biocompatibility of the unique MSNs.

A facile one-pot sol–gel approach was reported for the synthesis of monodisperse silica nanospheres (MSNs) with radially oriented mesochannels, tunable diameter ranging from 280 to 500 nm, by using cetyl trimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) as structure-directing agent, different amount of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) as the silica source and concentrated ammonia solution as the basic catalyst. Characterization and measurement using field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), low angle X-ray powder diffraction (LA-XRD) and nitrogen adsorption–desorption reveal that the obtained monodisperse MSNs have uniform, radially aligned mesopore of about 2.3 nm, high surface area (about 960 m2/g) and large pore volume of 0.58 cm3/g. Cell experiments indicate that, they obtained MSNs possess excellent biocompatibility and the smaller MSNs have relatively lower cytotoxicity.

Graphical abstractA series of monodisperse silica nanospheres (MSNs) with radially oriented mesopore, tunable diameters have been synthesized via a facile one-pot sol–gel approach using surfactants as the templates. Cell experiments indicate that, the obtained MSNs possess excellent biocompatibility and the smaller MSNs have relatively lower cytotoxicity.Figure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slide