Fluorescent probes articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Norepinephrine (NE) is a key neurotransmitter in the central nervous system of organisms however specifically tracking the transient NE dynamics with high spatiotemporal resolution in living systems remains a great challenge. Herein, the authors developed a small molecular fluorescent probe that can precisely anchor on neuronal cytomembranes and specifically respond to NE on a 100-ms timescale.

    • Leiwen Mao
    • , Yujie Han
    •  & Yang Tian

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Fluorogenic detection of H2O2 in cells is established, but equivalent tools to monitor its cellular targets remain in their infancy. Here authors develop fluorogenic probes for detecting cysteine sulfenic acid, a redox modification inextricably linked to H2O2 signalling and oxidative stress.

    • Renan B. Ferreira
    • , Ling Fu
    •  & Kate S. Carroll

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Expanding the responsive dyes repertoire is currently a developing field in biorthogonal chemistry. In this article, the authors develop fluorophores that turn on their near-infrared fluorescence upon biorthogonal reaction based on a “torsion-induced disaggregation” approach, allowing for sensitive in vivo imaging of tumors.

    • Xianghan Zhang
    • , Jingkai Gao
    •  & Zhongliang Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Super-resolution microscopy is a powerful tool for cellular studies but requires bright and stable fluorescent probes. Here, the authors report on a strategy to introduce quinoxaline motifs to conventional probes to make them brighter, more photostable, larger Stokes shift, and demonstrate the probes for biosensing applications.

    • Gangwei Jiang
    • , Tian-Bing Ren
    •  & Lin Yuan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Label discrimination is challenging in fluorescence microscopy due to broad spectra and narrow lifetime distribution. Here, the authors introduce extra kinetic dimensions by illuminating reversibly photoswitchable fluorophores with different intensities, and discriminate 20 spectrally similar fluorophores.

    • Raja Chouket
    • , Agnès Pellissier-Tanon
    •  & Ludovic Jullien

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Detection of the tumour boundary in prostate cancer is required for surgery. Here the authors present a fluorescent molecular rotor probe to target a prostate cancer marker, prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA), which they use in a xenograft mouse model to show it can be used for in vivo imaging.

    • Jingming Zhang
    • , Anastasia Rakhimbekova
    •  & Xing Yang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The electron-withdrawing target (EWT)-induced fluorescence quenching is an unsolved issue in intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) fluorophores that limits their applicability. Here, the authors report a simple and generalizable strategy to reverse the EWT-induced quenching mode into light-up mode, by introducing an indazole building block between the π-bridge and the donor in the ICT scaffold.

    • Chenxu Yan
    • , Zhiqian Guo
    •  & Wei-Hong Zhu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Currently available mitochondria-targeted fluorescent dyes emit only one color in the visible or NIR-I and their applications are limited. Here, the authors develop upconversion mitochondria-targeted NIR-II fluorophores for synchronous upconversion-mitochondria-targeted cell imaging, in vivo NIR-II osteosarcoma imaging and photothermal efficiency

    • Hui Zhou
    • , Xiaodong Zeng
    •  & Yuling Xiao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Fast and specific detection of pathogenic bacteria is needed to combat infections. Here the authors generate an array of near-infrared biosensors based on carbon nanotubes to detect released metabolites and virulence factors and use them to distinguish pathogens such as S. aureus and P. aeruginosa.

    • Robert Nißler
    • , Oliver Bader
    •  & Sebastian Kruss

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Conventional bioluminescence imaging usually operates in the visible region and its performance is limited by strong tissue absorption and scattering. Here, the authors present bioluminescence probes (BPs) with emission in the second near infrared (NIR-II) region, and show the NIR-II-BPs could sensitively recognize tumor metastasis with a high tumor-to-normal tissue ratio.

    • Lingfei Lu
    • , Benhao Li
    •  & Fan Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Programmed cell death or apoptosis is an essential biological process that is impaired in some diseases and can be used to assess the effectiveness of drugs. Here the authors design Apo-15 as a fluorogenic peptide for the detection and real-time imaging of apoptotic cells.

    • Nicole D. Barth
    • , Ramon Subiros-Funosas
    •  & Marc Vendrell

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cell surface proteins mediate the interactions between cells and their extracellular environment. Here the authors design synthetic biomemetic receptor-like sensors that facilitate programmable interactions between bacteria and their target.

    • Naama Lahav-Mankovski
    • , Pragati Kishore Prasad
    •  & David Margulies

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Fluorescent probes are used in a number of fields but suffer from a lack of quantifiable results due to environmental effects. Here, the authors report on a dual-emission probe which can be used to detect the amount of probe present and the emission from detection applications to allow for quantification.

    • Limin Shi
    • , Chenxu Yan
    •  & Wei-Hong Zhu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nanopore detection of small molecules can be improved using molecular carriers, but separating a small analyte from the carrier signal can be challenging. Here the authors address this challenge using simultaneous electrical and optical readout in nanopore sensing to detect small molecules and quantify binding affinities.

    • Shenglin Cai
    • , Jasmine Y. Y. Sze
    •  & Joshua B. Edel

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The enzyme serine hydroxymethyltransferase (SHMT) has been implicated in several diseases, however is hard to investigate. Here, the authors used a design strategy based on the retro-aldol-type reaction catalyzed by SHMT to develop SHMT-responsive fluorescence and 19F NMR molecular probes.

    • Hiroshi Nonaka
    • , Yuki Nakanishi
    •  & Shinsuke Sando

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Traditional optical organic vapor sensors with solvatochromic shift mechanisms have lower sensitivity due to weak intermolecular interactions. Here, the authors report a general strategy to prepare a higher sensitivity optical organic vapor sensor through polymeric swelling-induced variation of fluorescent intensity.

    • Xiangyu Jiang
    • , Hanfei Gao
    •  & Lei Jiang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    BODIPY dyes, though widely explored, have not been pursued as chromophore reaction based chemical probes. Here, the authors synthesize a meso-naked BODIPY core flanked with two electron-withdrawing groups, which undergoes a reversible change in conjugated structure in the presence of base and functions as a dual signal and ultrahigh turn-on ratio chemical probe.

    • Dehui Hu
    • , Tao Zhang
    •  & Guoqiang Yang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hypoxia is a hallmark of many diseases including cancer and ischemia, and detection can be invasive and of low resolution and specificity. Here the authors show a hypoxia probe that converts non-ionizing light to ultrasound, which enables the acquisition of high-resolution 3D images in deep tissue.

    • Hailey J. Knox
    • , Jamila Hedhli
    •  & Jefferson Chan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Heterocycles are ubiquitous in bioactive compounds and routes to different substitution patterns are important to access the full substrate space. Here the authors report a route to 4,5,7,8-substituted antiviral fluorescent quinazolines, to allow cellular uptake visualization without external marker.

    • Felix E. Held
    • , Anton A. Guryev
    •  & Svetlana B. Tsogoeva

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The success of a fluorescent dye as a molecular probe to monitor the intracellular activity of biomolecules depends on its physicochemical characteristics. Here, the authors use a predictive model to identify key features that allow them to design cell permeable, background-free fluorescent probes.

    • Samira Husen Alamudi
    • , Rudrakanta Satapathy
    •  & Young-Tae Chang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Functionalizing antimicrobial peptides with fluorescent groups is a useful strategy for imaging infection, but the tag can alter the performance of the probe. Here, the authors report a spacer-free method to directly functionalise an amino acid with a fluorogenic group and prepare peptide-based imaging agents for fungal infection.

    • Lorena Mendive-Tapia
    • , Can Zhao
    •  & Marc Vendrell

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Real time cellular fluorescence imaging requires a probe that displays high degrees of localisation, low toxicity and good photostability. Here, the authors report a near infrared fluorophore that displays pH-sensitive fluorescence based on phenol/phenolate interconversion, showing real time imaging of cellular processes.

    • Marco Grossi
    • , Marina Morgunova
    •  & Donal F. O’Shea

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Quantum dots with different size emit light at different wavelengths but also different brightness, which complicates analysis of fluorescence images. Here, the authors synthesize multicolour brightness-equalized quantum dots by controlling the composition and structure of core-shell HgCdSeS-CdZnS nanocrystals.

    • Sung Jun Lim
    • , Mohammad U. Zahid
    •  & Andrew M. Smith

  • Article
    | Open Access

    STED nanoscopy enables sub-diffraction imaging with a wide range of fluorescent probes. Here, the authors show that a bright and very photostable class of fluorescent quantum dots can be super-resolved with STED as biolabels in cellular contexts.

    • Janina Hanne
    • , Henning J. Falk
    •  & Stefan W. Hell

  • Article |

    Surface characterization of soft materialsin situis challenging due to the importance of non-covalent interactions. Now, a new chemical imaging method is reported that generates images of surface interactions by combining many molecular probe trajectories.

    • Robert Walder
    • , Nathaniel Nelson
    •  & Daniel K. Schwartz

  • Article |

    Molecular probes that can detect aqueous sulphides could help to elucidate their roles in biological signalling. Qianet al. develop two sulphide-selective fluorescent probes and demonstrate their ability to image free sulphide in living cells.

    • Yong Qian
    • , Jason Karpus
    •  & Chuan He

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