Synthesis of Biomimetic Ferrofluid with Apoferritin as a MRI Contrast Agent

Ferrofluids have great potential in various biomedical applications like in MRI as a contrast agent, Hyperther-mia, Drug delivery, magnetic separation. The special feature of ferrofluid is the combination of normal liquid behavior with superparamagnetic properties. Ferrofluids are synthesized by the chemical co-precipitation method using PVA and Apoferritin. Apoferritin is an iron storing protein, 8nm in diameter, devoid of the ferrihydrite core and can accommodate upto 4500 iron atoms. Hence it can increase the concentration of iron in the ferrofluid sample and hence increase the magnetization and thus the contrast.
The nanofluid was characterized using XRD, VSM, Con-focal laser scanning microscope, Photoluminescence spec-troscopy, AFM, FTIR. Flurescence Quenching of the Ferro-fluid was carried out.Cytotoxicity test was carried out on two cell lines HEK and EAC.