Detection of ZrO2 Nanoparticles in Lung Tissue Sections by Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry and Ion Beam Microscopy
by
Lothar Veith 1,2,*
, Julia Böttner 3, Antje Vennemann 4, Daniel Breitenstein 1, Carsten Engelhard 2, Jan Meijer 5, Irina Estrela-Lopis 3, Martin Wiemann 4,* and Birgit Hagenhoff 1
Lothar Veith 1,2,*, Julia Böttner 3, Antje Vennemann 4, Daniel Breitenstein 1, Carsten Engelhard 2, Jan Meijer 5, Irina Estrela-Lopis 3, Martin Wiemann 4,* and Birgit Hagenhoff 1
1
Tascon GmbH, Mendelstraße 17, 48149 Münster, Germany
2
Department of Chemistry & Biology, University of Siegen, Adolf-Reichwein-Straße 2, 57076 Siegen, Germany
3
Institute for Medical Physics & Biophysics, Leipzig University, Härtelstraße 16-18, 04107 Leipzig, Germany
4
IBE R&D Institute for Lung Health gGmbH, Mendelstraße 11, 48149 Münster, Germany
5
Felix-Bloch Institute for Solid State Physics, Leipzig University, Linnéstraße 5, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
*
Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Nanomaterials 2018, 8(1), 44; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano8010044
Received: 26 October 2017 / Revised: 15 December 2017 / Accepted: 28 December 2017 / Published: 15 January 2018
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nanoparticles in Vivo and in Vitro Studies: A Collection of Parallel Approaches)
The increasing use of nanoparticles (NP) in commercial products requires elaborated techniques to detect NP in the tissue of exposed organisms. However, due to the low amount of material, the detection and exact localization of NP within tissue sections is demanding. In this respect, Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) and Ion Beam Microscopy (IBM) are promising techniques, because they both offer sub-micron lateral resolutions along with high sensitivities. Here, we compare the performance of the non-material-consumptive IBM and material-consumptive ToF-SIMS for the detection of ZrO2 NP (primary size 9–10 nm) in rat lung tissue. Unfixed or methanol-fixed air-dried cryo-sections were subjected to IBM using proton beam scanning or to three-dimensional ToF-SIMS (3D ToF-SIMS) using either oxygen or argon gas cluster ion beams for complete sample sputtering. Some sample sites were analyzed first by IBM and subsequently by 3D ToF-SIMS, to compare results from exactly the same site. Both techniques revealed that ZrO2 NP particles occurred mostly agglomerated in phagocytic cells with only small quantities being associated to the lung epithelium, with Zr, S, and P colocalized within the same biological structures. However, while IBM provided quantitative information on element distribution, 3D ToF-SIMS delivered a higher lateral resolution and a lower limit of detection under these conditions. We, therefore, conclude that 3D ToF-SIMS, although not yet a quantitative technique, is a highly valuable tool for the detection of NP in biological tissue.
View Full-Text
Keywords:
ToF-SIMS; ion beam microscopy; particle-induced X-ray emission; ZrO2 nanoparticles; lung tissue; instillation; toxicity; gas cluster ion beam; delayed extraction
▼
Show Figures
Graphical abstract
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited
MDPI and ACS Style
Veith, L.; Böttner, J.; Vennemann, A.; Breitenstein, D.; Engelhard, C.; Meijer, J.; Estrela-Lopis, I.; Wiemann, M.; Hagenhoff, B. Detection of ZrO2 Nanoparticles in Lung Tissue Sections by Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry and Ion Beam Microscopy. Nanomaterials 2018, 8, 44.
Show more citation formats
Note that from the first issue of 2016, MDPI journals use article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.
