Real-Time Monitoring ATP in Mitochondrion of Living Cells: A Specific Fluorescent Probe for ATP by Dual Recognition Sites

Abstract

Adenosine triphosphate (ATP) is mainly produced in the mitochondrion and used as a universal energy source for various cellular events. Various fluorescent probes for ATP have been established successfully, but most of them are not appropriate for monitoring the fluctuation of the mitochondrial ATP level. Herein, a fluorescent probe named Mito-Rh is first synthesized and used to recognize ATP in mitochondrion. In the probe, rhodamine, diethylenetriamine, and triphenylphosphonium are selected as fluorophore, reaction site, and mitochondrion-targeting group, respectively. Probe Mito-Rh shows high sensitivity to ATP with 81-fold fluorescence enhancement, and the detection range (0.1-10 mM) can match the concentration level of ATP in the mitochondrion. Moreover, Mito-Rh provides excellent selectivity toward ATP over other biological anions (ADP, AMP, GTP, CTP, UTP) owing to a concurrent effect of dual recognition sites (hydrogen bond and π-π stacking). In particular, the probe can localize in mitochondrion specifically and demonstrates utility in the real-time detection of mitochondrial ATP concentration changes.

Molecular Receptors for Recognition and Sensing of Nucleotides

“…Li and co‐workers attached an additional triphenylphosphonium group to the dye as a mitochondrion‐targeting group ( 8 ) and could monitor the fluctuations of ATP in the concentrations range 0.1–10 m m . The fluorescent enhancement upon ATP binding (80‐fold) was approximately ten times stronger than that found for other nucleotides . Similarly, boronic acid derivative 9 was designed to bind the sugar residue of the nucleotide, whereas rhodamine was proposed to stack with adenine .…”

A Coumarin-Benzothiazole Derivative as a FRET-Based Chemosensor of Adenosine 5′-Triphosphate

“…Several molecular probes for fluorescent sensing of ATP have been reported [13][14][15][16][17][18]. However, these probes function through monitoring changes in single emission intensities which is vulnerable to alterations from external factors such as temperature, pH, and solvent polarity.…”

A Couple of Tripodal and Dipodal Fluorescent Sensors for Sequential “On‐Off‐On” Response to Cu2+ and ATP/ADP Recognition in Aqueous Solution

“…Just as important as the metal ions detection, the development of chemosensors for biologically essential anions recognition, for example nucleoside polyphosphates, has become an active research area ,. Adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and adenosine diphosphate (ADP) are vital nucleoside polyphosphates, which play pivotal roles in biological processes including bioenergetic conversion and enzyme catalysis . In order to overcome the solvent effect and realize recognition process in physiological environment, different categories of probes have been broadly utilized for ATP recognition including metal complexes, quantum dots, and self‐assembled micelles .…”