Fluorescent Nanodiamonds

Preface

Fluorescent nanodiamond (FND) is a carbon‐based nanomaterial with exceptional physicochemical properties and extraordinary functional capacities. Invented in 2005, FND evolved from the studies of nanometer‐sized diamond particles and color centers in bulk diamonds. The invention was followed by an ever‐growing list of applications in diverse areas of science and engineering, which has led to fast increasing interests among researchers worldwide. While all is going well and fine, it brings us to the question:

Why this book now?

There are two versions of answers to this question: a comprehensive answer obviously requires reading the entire book and the brief one (perhaps, also closer to our initial thoughts) is shared here.

As illustrated multiple times in the book, the FND’s superior biocompatibility coupled with its long emission lifetimes makes it a unique drug carrier with an added benefit that its movement in living organisms can be tracked in three dimensions and of real time. Using FND as a platform for drug delivery falls in the hardcore of the much‐anticipated development in nanomedicine, which actively looks for new solution in target‐selective and site‐specific therapeutic treatments at the molecular level. This is the medicine of the twenty‐first century and, when fully developed, FND will have a great role to play in the field. The foreseeable impact on human physiology and health is so profound that it may change the way the therapeutic treatment is delivered ...