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Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging of Molecular Rotors in Living Cells
Published on: February 9, 2012
Molecular rotors: Synthesis and evaluation as viscosity sensors
Jeyanthy Sutharsan1, Darcy Lichlyter, Nathan E Wright
1Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA 92093-0358, USA.
None:
It has been shown that compounds containing the p-N,N,-dialkylaminobenzylidene cyanoacetate motif can serve as fluorescent non-mechanical viscosity sensors. These compounds, referred to as molecular rotors, belong to a class of fluorescent probes that are known to form twisted intramolecular charge-transfer complexes in the excited state. In this study we present the synthesis and spectroscopic characterization of these compounds as viscosity sensors. The effects of the molecular structure and electronic density of these rotors to the emission wavelength, fluorescence intensity and viscosity sensitivity are discussed.
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