A Simple Water-Soluble ESIPT Fluorescent Probe for Fluoride Ion with Large Stokes Shift in Living Cells

• Published in: ACS omega Vol. 5; no. 34; pp. 21684 - 21688
• Main Authors: Liu, Xu, Liu, Xin, Shen, Youming, Gu, Biao
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Chemical Society 01.09.2020
• ISSN: 2470-1343; 2470-1343
• DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.0c02589

Developing an effective method for monitoring fluoride ion in biological samples is meaningful because fluoride ion plays a vital role in biological processes. In this contribution, a simple water-soluble ESIPT fluorescent probe 2-((4-((tert-butyldiphenylsilyl)­oxy)-1,3-dioxoisoindolin-2-yl)­methyl)-1-ethylpyridin-1-ium iodide (SPI) was constructed for monitoring fluoride ion. The probe SPI containing pyridinium salt group exhibited preeminent water solubility. The probe SPI introducing a trimethyldiphenylsilyl ether recognition group displayed excellent selectivity for fluoride ion over other biologically relevant species. Additionally, the probe SPI exhibited a fast response for a fluoride ion, suggesting that it could provide real-time fluoride ion detection. Importantly, the probe could detect fluoride ion with a linear range of 0–70.0 × 10–6 M and a low detection limit of 1.16 × 10–6 M. Furthermore, probe SPI could detect fluoride ion with a large Stokes shift (98 nm), which was attributed to ESIPT fluorescence sensing process. At last, probe SPI was successfully employed to monitor fluoride ion in living cells.