Real time detection of glutathionse in chemotherapy squamous-cell carcinoma cells of a fluorescent probe

Glutathione (GSH) plays a key role in protecting damage induced by radiation and chemotherapy drugs. Current methods, which quantify GSH level changes by using cellular extraction or being based on redox homeostasis results, are unable to directly measure real time GSH level in live cells. In this article, we utilized a newly designed reversible fluorescent probe to measure GSH in living cells. The image of probe 1 can reveal intracellular GSH location and GSH level changes caused by different chemotherapy drugs in squamous-cell carcinoma cells. The results show that it is the first report with probe 1 that to quantify real-time GSH level changes in the cultured chemotherapy cancer cells and different changes in GSH level that may confer chemotherapy resistance. •A reversible fluorescent probe which is useful for measuring real time cellular GSH changes.•GSH changes in live cancer cells during different chemotherapy.•It can help us to understand the role of GSH in cancer chemotherapy resistance.