Colloidal Ordered Assemblies in a Polymer Shell-A Novel Type of Magnetic Nanobeads for Theranostic Applications

We present the synthesis of polymer embedded colloidal ordered assemblies, built from highly ordered superparamagnetic manganese iron oxide nanocrystals. Each assembly is wrapped into a thin polymer shell. In-depth characterization of the nanoparticles by TEM, SAXS, SQUID, and magnetophoresis indicates that these colloidal hybrids exhibit high mobilities in external magnetic fields, and that they could efficiently serve as contrast enhancers in magnetic resonance imaging.