Yellow Fluorescent Semiconducting Polymer Dots with High Brightness, Small Size, and Narrow Emission for Biological Applications

ACS Macro Lett. 2014 Oct 21;3(10):1051-1054. doi: 10.1021/mz500383c. Epub 2014 Oct 3.

Abstract

Cross-linked polymer dots with intense and narrow yellow emission were designed using boron-dipyrromethene (BODIPY) polymer as the acceptor and poly[9,9-dioctylfluorenyl-2,7-diyl-co-1,4-benzo-{2,1'-3}-thiadiazole] (PFBT) polymer as the donor. The emission fwhm's of the polymer dots (Pdots) were 37 nm. CL-BODIPY 565 Pdots were about 5 times brighter than commercial quantum dots (Qdots) 565 under identical experimental conditions. Specific cellular targeting indicated that the small, bright, and narrow emissive CL-BODIPY 565 Pdots are promising probes for biological applications.