Miniature AIE Dots for Bioimaging, Diagnosis and Therapy

Traditional Π-conjugated fluorophores are prone to aggregate with light emission quenching which is known as aggregation-caused quenching (ACQ). We have observed an opposite phenomenon termed "aggregation-induced emission" (AIE) and identified the restriction of intramolecular rotation (RIR) as the main reason for the AIE effect. The miniature AIE Dots mentioned here include bare AIE dots that spontaneously aggregated in biological systems, AIE dots prepared by encapsulation and AIE dye labelled polymer dots or silica NPs (Fig.1).¹ It has been found that the AIE dots show superior features to conventional organic dyes and QDs, such as large absorptivity, high brightness, excellent biocompatibility, free of random blinking, and strong photobleaching resistance.^{1, 2a, b, c} These merits have enabled the use of AIEgens in fluorescent imaging at the subcellular, cellular and tissue levels in a noninvasive and high contrast manner.