Designed Er3+-singly doped NaYF4 with double excitation bands for simultaneous deep macroscopic and microscopic upconverting bioimaging

Simultaneous deep macroscopic imaging and microscopic imaging is in urgent demand, but is challenging to achieve experimentally due to the lack of proper fluorescent probes. Herein, we have designed and successfully synthesized simplex Er3+-doped upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs) with double excitation bands for simultaneous deep macroscopic and microscopic imaging. The material structure and the excitation wavelength of Er3+-singly doped UCNPs were further optimized to enhance the upconversion emission efficiency. After optimization, we found that NaYF4:30%Er3+@NaYF4:2%Er3+ could simultaneously achieve efficient two-photon excitation (2PE) macroscopic tissue imaging and three-photon excitation (3PE) deep microscopic when excited by 808 nm continuous wave (CW) and 1480 nm CW lasers, respectively. In vitro cell imaging and in vivo imaging have also been implemented to demonstrate the feasibility and potential of the proposed simplex Er3+-doped UCNPs as bioprobe.