Preparation of polylysine-modified superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles

Polylysine (PLL) coated iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) have potential in biomedical application. In the present work PEG coated SPIONs (PEG-SPIONs) with the particle size of 9.4 ± 1.4 nm were synthesized by thermal decomposition of Fe(acac)3 in PEG, and then coated with PLL (PLL/PEG-SPIONs). The PEG-SPIONs and PLL/PEG-SPIONs were superparamagnetic with the saturation magnetization of 53 and 44 emu/g, respectively. The hydrodynamic diameter of PEG-SPIONs in deionized water was 18.8 nm, which increased to 21.3-28.2 nm after mixing with different amount of PLL. The zeta potentials of PLL/PEG-SPIONs were -8.9 - -3.4 mV which were changing with time. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analyses indicated that PLL was attached to the PEG-SPIONs. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.