A disaggregation-induced emission strategy to obtain dual-emission fluorescence-enhanced probe for visualization of SO2 fluctuation in living cells, tumor tissue and zebrafish

The emergence of disaggregation-induced emission (DIE) probes has provided new insights into the traditional aggregation-caused quenching (ACQ) dyes. However, establishing and achieving promising DIE platforms for biomedical imaging is still a major challenge. In this study, for the first time, we designed a novel DIE platform based on highly planar chromenoquinoline derivatives to obtain dual-emission enhanced SO2 probe. Highly planarized chromenoquinoline derivatives with strong π-π stacking interactions are extremely prone to aggregation, resulting in partial fluorescence quenching. Interestingly, the addition of SO2 to probe DEE-1 caused partial disaggregation of chromenoquinoline derivatives, which evoked the dual-emission enhancement derived from disaggregation-induced emission in the long-wavelength region (λem = 625 nm, 5-fold) and SO2 addition peak in the short-wavelength region (λem = 510 nm, 15-fold). Significantly, these unique probes DEE-1 and DEE-2 were successfully employed for dual-channel imaging of the SO2 fluctuation in living cells, tumor tissue and zebrafish, highlighting the great potential of disaggregation-induced emission strategy. Thus, this work not only provide a dual-emission fluorescence-enhanced tool to investigate and study the signal molecules (SO2), but also deliver clues for the development of more potential probes for other analytes based on the DIE mechanism. [Display omitted] •A novel “disaggregation-induced emission” strategy was employed for design dual-emission fluorescence-enhanced SO2 probe.•DEE was prepared as the first disaggregation-induced dual-emission enhanced probe for detection of SO2 fluctuation.•The probe DEE displayed outstanding dual-channel enhancement towards SO2 in living cells, tumor tissue and zebrafish.