Measurement of fluorescence in a rhodamine-123 doped self-assembled "giant" mesostructured silica sphere using a smartphone as optical hardware

The blue OLED emission from a mobile phone was characterized, revealing a sharp emission band centered at X = 445 nm with a 3dB bandwidth Δ ~ 20 nm. It was used to excite Rhodamine 123 doped within a -giant{norm of matrix} mesostructured silica sphere during fabrication through evaporative self-assembly of silica nanoparticles. Fluorescence was able to be detected using a standard optical microscope fitted with a green transmission pass filter and cooled CCD and with 1 ms exposure time demonstrating the potential of mobile platforms as the basis for portable diagnostics in the field. © 2011 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland