Selective Imaging of HClO in the Liver Tissue In Vivo Using a Near-infrared Hepatocyte-specific Fluorescent Probe

Liver injury is typified by an inflammatory response. Hypochlorous acid (HClO), an important endogenous reactive oxygen species, is regarded as a biomarker associated with liver injury. Near-infrared (NIR) fluorescent probes with the advantage of deep tissue penetrating and low auto-fluorescence interference are more suitable for bioimaging in vivo. Thus, in this work, we designed and synthesized a novel NIR hepatocyte-specific fluorescent probe named NHF. The probe NHF showed fast response (<3 s), large spectral variation, and good selectivity to trace HClO in buffer solution. By employing N-acetylgalactosamine (GalNAc) as the targeting ligand, probe NHF can be actively delivered to the liver tissue of zebrafish and mice. It is important that probe NHF is the first NIR hepatocyte-specific fluorescent probe, which successfully visualized the up-regulation of endogenous HClO in the oxygen-glucose deprivation/reperfusion (OGD/R) model HepG2 cells and dynamically monitored APAP-induced endogenous HClO in the liver tissue of zebrafish and mice.