Smart aggregation‐induced emission polymers: Preparation, properties and bio‐applications

Abstract

Owing to the outstanding photophysical properties, organic luminescent materials featuring aggregation-induced emission (AIE) characteristics have attracted wide attention in various fields. Numerous researches focused on low-mass AIE luminogens, and relatively less attention has been paid on AIE polymers and the related applications, in spite of the fact that AIE polymers exhibit excellent advantages of processability, multifunctional integration and synergistic effects. In this review, we briefly summarize and discuss the superiorities of AIE polymers in preparation, properties and bio-applications, and the considerable progress in these aspects are introduced as well. Finally, the structure-property relationship, challenges and opportunities are also discussed. Hopefully, this review will be a trigger for smart AIE polymer research and further broaden their applications. K E Y W O R D Saggregation-induced emission, lab-in-cell, multifunctional integration, smart polymer, synergistic amplification | INTRODUCTIONOrganic luminescent materials present significant potential in the real-time monitoring of bio-analytes and dynamic processes in living organisms, benefited from the advantages of good biocompatibility, property-structure tunability and preparation repeatability. [1] In recent years, kinds of organic fluorescent materials have been developed for bio-imaging, diagnosis and therapeutic applications with good performances. [2][3][4][5] Conventional fluorescent materials with conjugated structures display bright luminescence in the molecular state. However, these molecules will rapidly form aggregates and cause fluorescence quenching due to the strong intermolecular interactions under physiological environment, which is known as aggregation-caused quenching (ACQ) effect. This phenomenon seriously reduces the sensitivity andThis is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Enhancing tetraphenylethene cyclization as photoswitch

“…Since first reported by Tang and coworkers in 2007, [1] tetraphenylethene (TPE) has promoted intense interest in the development of aggregation-induced emission (AIE) [2][3][4][5][6][7][8] applications such as theranostics, [9][10][11] chiral applications, [12][13][14][15][16] and also in the assembly of more complex structures. [17][18][19] Therefore, TPE is well regarded as a star AIE building block to date.…”

Responsive soft actuators with MXene nanomaterials

“…soft robotics have not only improved the impedance matching of human-machine interfaces but also adjusted to unstructured surroundings, thus giving rise to innovative robotic capabilities. [20][21][22][23] Two-dimensional (2D) materials with outstanding electronic, [24] mechanical, [25] and optical properties [26,27] have been widely investigated in the field of soft actuators. MXene, a new family of multifunctional 2D solid crystals containing a large class of transition metal carbides, nitrides, and carbonitrides, was first reported by Prof. Michel W. Barsoum and Prof. Yury Gogotsi in 2011.…”