Recent progress in small molecule fluorescent probes for imaging and diagnosis of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has become one of the most common chronic metabolic liver diseases. However, the specific pathogenesis of NAFLD is still unclear. Moreover, there is a lack of effective targeted medicine for NAFLD. Numerous studies have manifested that the occurrence and development of NAFLD are an extremely tanglesome pathological process, which is closely linked with multitudinous substrates and intracellular microenvironments. Therefore, the development of reliable, specific, highly sensitive and non-invasiveness methods to in suit detect the changes of biological species and microenvironments will help to precisely diagnose of NAFLD and take corresponding measures. Current detection approaches, such as liver biopsy and ultrasound imaging, are difficult to achieve real-time, high spatial and temporal resolution, high sensitivity and non-destructive diagnosis of NAFLD. Fortunately, owing to these detection superiorities, fluorescence imaging technology has been widely applied for detection of biological species, microenvironments and diagnosis of NAFLD. In this regard, this review comprehensively described the design strategies, working principles, practical application, and disease molecular mechanisms of small molecule fluorescent probes for monitoring biological species and microenvironments in the occurrence and progression of NAFLD in recent years (2020–2023). Notably, we also emphasized the current deficiencies and future development directions, which will contribute to further reveal some underlying relationships between biological species, microenvironments and NAFLD, so as to propose potential diagnostic protocols and establish a platform for treatment and pharmacodynamic evaluation of NAFLD.