A Fluorescent Probe Based on Pyrene Ring for Detecting Cys and its Application in Biology

The identification of thiols has become a research hotspot due to its role in biological systems. In this work, we simply constructed a turn-on fluorescent probe named 3-(5-bromopyridin-3-yl)-1-(pyren-1-yl) prop-2-en-1-one, that a combination of pyrene ring and substituted pyridine via the connection of α, β-unsaturated ketone. Cys can destroy the space effect by Michael addition reaction, which makes the fluorescence intensity changes. Furthermore, the probe featured excellent selectivity and high sensitivity (the detection limit was 0.52 μM) by addition of Cys. Moreover, this probe suggested a potential for imaging in vivo owing to the successful imaging of the probe in HepG2 cells, zebrafish, and Arabidopsis thaliana.