Fluorophore-Labeling Tetraphenylethene Dyes Ranging from Visible to Near-Infrared Region: AIE Behavior, Performance in Solid State, and Bioimaging in Living Cells

Functional molecules with aggregation-induced emission (AIE) have lately received the most attention due to their versatile functions in many fields. In this work, tetraphenylethene (TPE) as one of the most discussed AIE system was installed on different fluorophores including dansyl, naphthalimide, 4-nitro-1,2,3-benzoxadiazole (NBD), borondipyrromethene, and hemicyanine to afford a series of new fluorescent dyes, whose spectra covered the fluorescence region of the visible to near-infrared emission. Especially, these tetraphenylethene-containing compounds all exhibited AIE behavior. In solid state, they presented multiple colors including blue, orange, red, crimson, and NIR (near-infrared emission). It was worth mentioning that the dansyl- and NBD-coated TPEs exhibited obvious mechanoresponsive luminescence phenomena. Moreover, these AIE-based TPEs displayed a good bioimaging performance in living cells. This work will be helpful for designing functional AIE dyes with different fluorescence emission.