Abstract
An ideal fluorescent dye for staining cell organelles should have multiple properties including specificity, stability, biocompatibility, and a large Stokes shift. Tunable photophysical properties enable 1,8-naphthalimide to serve as an excellent fluorophore in biomedical applications. Many naphthalimide derivatives have been developed into drugs, sensors, and other dyes. In this study, a series of 1,8-naphthalimide derivatives targeting live cell mitochondria were synthesized. Among these probes, Mt-4 was characterized as the best one, with highly specific mitochondrial localization, low cytotoxicity, and a large Stokes shift. More importantly, Mt-4 stood out as a potential mitochondrial dye for living-cell experiments involving induced mitochondrial stress arising from the treatments because Mt-4 shows enhanced fluorescence in mitochondrial stress situations.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 1719-1724 |
Number of pages | 6 |
Journal | ChemBioChem |
Volume | 17 |
Issue number | 18 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Sep 15 2016 |
Keywords
- Stokes shifts
- fluorescent probes
- imaging agents
- mitochondria
- naphthalimide
- single live cells
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Biochemistry
- Molecular Medicine
- Molecular Biology
- Organic Chemistry