Engineering of a zero cross-talk fluorescent polymer nanoprobe for self-referenced ratiometric imaging of lysosomal hypochlorous acid in living cells
作者：Hongqing Wei,Rongjin Zeng, Shenglan Wang, Chong-Hua Zhang,Shu Chen,Peisheng Zha and Jian Chen
關鍵字：fluorescent polymer nanoparticles; fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET); ratiometric fluorescence detection; data encryption; fluorescent imaging
論文來源：期刊
發表時間：2020年
The rational design of a zero cross-talk self-referenced ratiometric fluorescent probe for accurately imaging molecular in living cells is still a major challenge. Herein, we report a zero cross-talk fluorescent polymer nanoprobe (named ZC-FPN) with self-referenced ratiometric effect for lysosomal hypochlorous acid (HClO) imaging via using a single-wavelength excitation. The newly designed polymer nanoprobe (ZC-FPN) is prepared by using a simple co-precipitation method through self-assembled of two amphiphilic block copolymers, which are covalently linked with a porphyrin fluorophore (HClOresponsive unit) and a naphthalimide fluorophore (reference unit), respectively. Remarkably, the ZC-FPN displays an unprecedented separation of two emission peaks (~191 nm), which can avoid the spectral cross-talk problem of the emissionshift type ratiometric probes and is highly favorable for high-resolution bioimaging. In addition, the as-prepared ZC-FPN also shows good water dispersibility, high selectivity, excellent long-term fluorescence stability (>10 weeks) as well as low cytotoxicity. More importantly, the positive charge of amino moiety enhances the efficient uptake of nanoprobe by cancer cells and enables the nanoprobe to selectively accumulate in lysosomes, achieving for endogenous HClO imaging in living cells through fluorescence ratiometric imaging.