AUTHOR=Karatum Onuralp , Aria Mohammad Mohammadi , Eren Guncem Ozgun , Yildiz Erdost , Melikov Rustamzhon , Srivastava Shashi Bhushan , Surme Saliha , Dogru Itir Bakis , Bahmani Jalali Houman , Ulgut Burak , Sahin Afsun , Kavakli Ibrahim Halil , Nizamoglu Sedat 

TITLE=Nanoengineering InP Quantum Dot-Based Photoactive Biointerfaces for Optical Control of Neurons

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neuroscience

VOLUME=15

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fnins.2021.652608

DOI=10.3389/fnins.2021.652608

ISSN=1662-453X

ABSTRACT=<p>Light-activated biointerfaces provide a non-genetic route for effective control of neural activity. InP quantum dots (QDs) have a high potential for such biomedical applications due to their uniquely tunable electronic properties, photostability, toxic-heavy-metal-free content, heterostructuring, and solution-processing ability. However, the effect of QD nanostructure and biointerface architecture on the photoelectrical cellular interfacing remained unexplored. Here, we unravel the control of the photoelectrical response of InP QD-based biointerfaces <italic>via</italic> nanoengineering from QD to device-level. At QD level, thin ZnS shell growth (∼0.65 nm) enhances the current level of biointerfaces over an order of magnitude with respect to only InP core QDs. At device-level, band alignment engineering allows for the bidirectional photoelectrochemical current generation, which enables light-induced temporally precise and rapidly reversible action potential generation and hyperpolarization on primary hippocampal neurons. Our findings show that nanoengineering QD-based biointerfaces hold great promise for next-generation neurostimulation devices.</p>