Aggregation-induced emission (AIE)-active compounds are attractive fluorescent materials for applications in chemical and biological sensing. The AIE effect of such materials amplifies changes in the fluorescence signal due to the physical state transformation from aggregation to disaggregation, which can be employed for detecting various analytes with high sensitivity. In particular, specific bio-active analyte recognition is not only very interesting but also challenging. In this paper, we report a set of novel AIE-active fluorescent probes containing pyridiniums and boric acid groups (TPA-PP, TPA-PPA-1, TPA-PPA-2, TPA-PPA-3), which has been developed for adenosine 5′-triphosphate (ATP) recognition. These probes with two types of interaction modes and multiple connection sites toward ATP molecules are able to selectively discriminate ATP among other bioactive anions with a significant enhancement in fluorescence emission. In particular, in the application of cell imaging, as the number of positive charges and boric acid group increased further, the probes could penetrate into cells, and then enter into the nucleus very specifically. These results clearly demonstrate that the newly developed sensors are suitable for specific tracing of different cell organelles with a height visualization and retention ability. Therefore, all of them are confirmed as promising alternatives for live cell imaging in the future.
In the context of an increasingly escalating antibiotics crisis, phototherapy has emerged as a promising therapeutic approach due to its inherent advantages, including high selectivity, noninvasiveness, and low drug resistance. Photothermal therapy (PTT) and photodynamic therapy (PDT) are two complementary and promising phototherapies albeit with inherent limitations, noted as the challenges in achieving precise heat confinement and the associated risk of off-target damage for PTT, while the constraints due to the hypoxic microenvironment are prevalent in biofilms faced by PDT. Herein, we have designed a supramolecular nanoformulation that leverages the complexation-induced quenching of guanidinium-modified calix[5]arene grafted with fluorocarbon chains (GC5AF5), the efficient recognition of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), and the oxygen-carrying capacity of the fluorocarbon chain. This intelligent nanoformulation enables the adaptive enhancement of both photothermal therapy (PTT) and photodynamic therapy (PDT), allowing for on-demand switching between the two modalities. Our nanoformulation utilizes ATP released by dead bacteria to accelerate the elimination of biofilms, rendering bacteria unable to resist while minimizing harm to healthy tissues. This research highlights the particular recognition and assembly capabilities of macrocycles, offering a promising strategy for creating potent, combined antibiofilm therapies.
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