Perspective: Aggregation-induced emission as an emerging strategy for exploring pharmacokinetics of oral polysaccharides

Clinical application of polysaccharides is severely limited by their various pending and controversial pharmacokinetics problems. Thus, it is urgent to develop accurate detection methods for polysaccharides and their metabolites. Aggregation-induced emission (AIE) is a unique photophysical phenomenon of propeller-shaped molecules. Currently, AIE has been successfully used to realize visualization for gelation process of polysaccharides, and accurate monitoring of spatiotemporal drug release of doxorubicin. In particular, authors found that aggregation event always happens during the pharmacokinetic process. Therefore, it is proposed that AIE can be a promising method for accurate detection of polysaccharides as well as elucidation of their bioavailability.