Bio‐/Chemosensors and Imaging with Aggregation‐Induced Emission Luminogens

Abstract

Aggregation-induced emission (AIE) luminogens show abnormal fluorescent behavior; they are non-emissive in solution, but they become strongly emissive after aggregation. Sensing and imaging are the major applications of AIE luminogens. By properly manipulating the aggregation and deaggregation of AIE molecules, various bio-/chemosensors have been developed. Moreover, AIE molecules with targeting groups have been devised for imaging of organelles and cancer cells. In this account, we report our recent work on the application of AIE luminogens for the construction of bio-/chemosensors and imaging.

Non-aromatic annulene-based aggregation-induced emission system via aromaticity reversal process

“…Typical AIE systems show quenched emission in the solution state since the dynamic intramolecular motion accelerates the non-radiative decay process of the excited state 12–15 , while in the solid state the restriction of intramolecular rotation (RIR) and intramolecular vibration (RIV) suppresses the non-radiative decay and thus generate a high-fluorescence quantum efficiency 12 . So far, AIE systems based on RIR have been deeply investigated both mechanistically and in practice, based on which versatile solid-state fluorescent materials and stimuli-responsive fluorescent probes were developed 12–16 . However, molecular systems based on RIV are still rather limited in variety due to the unclear molecular design and the intrinsic difficulty in regulating the vibrational magnitude than the rotation magnitude, although vibrations are more general than rotation as a motion mode 17,18 .…”

In vivomonitoring of tissue regeneration using a ratiometric lysosomal AIE probe

“…In recent decades, AIEgens have been proved to possess high photostability, large Stokes shi, excellent capability of longterm tracking and good biocompatibility. [55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67] Although great attention has been paid to tissue regeneration and lysosome study, 4,5,27,28,[68][69][70] monitoring lysosomal pH during tissue regeneration in vivo has not been investigated yet.…”

Fluorescent Materials With Aggregation-Induced Emission Characteristics for Array-Based Sensing Assay

“…Materials with AIE characteristics draw the attention of researchers from all around world and have become a hot research topic. With the continuous endeavor, lots of their applications in chemical sensing, bioimaging, and photodynamic therapy have been made (Dai et al, 2000;Ding et al, 2013;Li et al, 2013;Kwok et al, 2014;Lou et al, 2016;Zhan et al, 2016;Qian and Tang, 2017). Recently, their applications in array-based sensing have also been explored.…”