An AIE active pyrene based fluorescent probe for selective sensing Hg2+ and imaging in live cells

A novel fluorescence probe pyrene based derivatives ( 1 ) with aggregation induced emission (AIE) properties was synthesized by an easy procedure. The probe 1 was characterized by UV–vis, Fluorescent, NMR, MS, SEM etc. It displayed high sensitivity and selectivity to Hg 2+ compared with other metal ions in H 2 O/DMF solvent and the detection limit was 4.2 × 10 −7  M. Upon addition of Hg 2+ , the 1  − Hg 2+ compound was formed with the formation of 2:1. More importantly, the probe exhibited very low cytotoxicity and strong fluorescence emission in live cells. This showed that the probe had potential applications for detection of Hg 2+ in environment and biosystems.