Methods using photothermal nanoparticles in rapid nucleic acid amplification and photothermal nanoparticles

A method for rapid amplification of a nucleic acid molecule with a polymerase chain reaction comprising:

• forming a reaction mixture including a nucleic acid template, a polymerase enzyme, and a heating media on a substrate, a microchip, a plate, or a multi-well plate including photothermal nanoparticles immobilized on a substrate surface of the substrate, fabricated on the microchip, or fabricated on a surface of the plate or a well of the multi-well plate, wherein the photothermal nanoparticles are made essentially of gold and have a particular geometric shape and comprise a single component or a multi-component, and the photothermal nanoparticles are further categorized by surface plasmon resonance with a resonance wavelength in a particular range to convert energy absorbed from a light source to sufficiently heat a volume of a composition for transcription of a new nucleic acid strand, and wherein the particular geometric shape is selected from the group consisting of:
• polyhedral, spheroid, torus, and hollow shapes;
• and
• irradiating the reaction mixture at a wavelength ranging from 300 nm to 1500 nm, depending on the particular geometric shape of the photothermal nanoparticles, sufficient for heating the reaction mixture at a rate up to 75 degrees Celsius per second to complete amplification thermal cycles in 15 minutes or less time by adjusting a concentration of photothermal nanoparticles.