No abstract

Intracellular viscosity is a crucial parameter that indicates the functioning of cells. In this work, we demonstrate the utility of TPE-Cy, a cell-permeable dye with aggregation-induced emission (AIE) property, in mapping the viscosity inside live cells. Owing to the AIE characteristics, both the fluorescence intensity and lifetime of this dye are increased along with an increase in viscosity. Fluorescence lifetime imaging of live cells stained with TPE-Cy reveals that the lifetime in lipid droplets is much shorter than that from the general cytoplasmic region. The loose packing of the lipids in a lipid droplet results in low viscosity and thus shorter lifetime of TPE-Cy in this region. It demonstrates that the AIE dye could provide good resolution in intracellular viscosity sensing. This is also the first work in which AIE molecules are applied in fluorescence lifetime imaging and intracellular viscosity sensing.

A new Cu2+ compound Cu- NB, (where H2 NB is bis(2-hydroxyl-naphthalene-carboxaldehyde) benzil dihydrazone) was synthesized as a highly selective fluorescence chemosensor for the detection of Hg2+ in aqueous media through a displacement "turn-on" signaling strategy. Whereas the coordination of Cu2+ resulted in a considerable quenching of the typical luminescence of the naphthol rings in Cu-NB, the addition of Hg2+ ion led to a dramatic increase in the emission intensity of Cu-NB at about 530 nm (excitation at 430 nm). The competitive fluorescent experiments showed that alkali, alkaline earth metal ions, the group 12 metals Zn2+, Cd2+, the first-row transition-metal ions such as Mn2+, Fe2+, Co2+, and Ni2+, as well as Pb2+ could not inhibit the Hg2+-binding fluorescent enhancement. It is postulated that the existence of Cu2+ in the luminescent probe Cu-NB could turn away the interferences of other metal cations from Hg2+ detection. The optical responses of the free ligand upon addition of Cu2+ ion, and of the Hg-H2NB compound upon the addition of Cu2+ were also investigated for comparisons.