A Water-Stable and Red-Emissive Radical Cation for Mutp53 Cancer Therapy

Compared with conventional closed-shell fluorophores, radical cations provide an opportunity for development of red-to-NIR fluorophores with small sizes and easy preparation. However, most radical cations reported in the literature suffer from poor stability in water solution and are almost non-emissive. To tackle this challenge, we herein develop a deep-red-emissive and water-stable pyrrole radical cation P⋅⁺ -DPA-Zn, which can be easily generated from P-DPA-Zn by air oxidation. The deep-red-emissive P⋅⁺ -DPA-Zn can be used for imaging-guided mitochondria-targeted delivery of Zn²⁺ into cancer cells to promote mutant p53 proteins degradation and abrogate mutp53-manifested gain of function, including reduced chemotherapy resistance, inhibited cancer cell migration, decreased tumor cell colony and sphere formation. The water-stable and deep-red emissive pyrrole radical cation is thus promising for cancer theranostic applications.