Dipole‐Dipole and Anion‐π⁺ Interaction Manipulation Synergistically Enhance Intrinsic Antibacterial Activities of AIEgens

Pathogenic bacteria infections, especially multidrug resistant bacteria infections have aroused worldwide attention due to their severe threats to human beings. Thus, the development of highly effective antibacterial reagents is very important. However, the design of antimicrobials is still quite challenging for the lack of a universal design strategy. Here, a synergistic manipulation strategy of dipole-dipole and anion-π⁺ interaction is proposed for constructing highly efficient antimicrobials with aggregation-induced emission (AIE) feature. Firstly, four anion-π⁺ -type AIE luminogens were designed and synthesized. Due to the electron-donating and hydrophilic characteristic of methoxy groups, 3MOTPO containing three methoxy groups showed the largest dipole moment (5.06 Debye) and dual anion-π⁺ interactions in the solid state. Driven by both dipole-dipole and anion-π⁺ interactions, 3MOTPO showed the strongest bacterial binding ability and the best antibacterial activities (MIC₉₀ =3.76 μM). The work offers a deep insight into the rational design of highly efficient antimicrobials for luminescence-guided antibacterial study.