The fact that the lifetime of photoluminescence is often difficult to access because of the weakness of the emission signals, seriously limits the possibility to gain local bioimaging information in time-resolved luminescence probing. We aim to provide a solution to this problem by creating a general photophysical strategy based on the use of molecular probes designed for single-luminophore dual thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF). The structural and conformational design makes the dual TADF strong in both diluted solution and in an aggregated state, thereby reducing sensitivity to oxygen quenching and enabling a unique dual-channel time-resolved imaging capability. As the two TADF signals show mutual complementarity during probing, a dual-channel means that lifetime mapping is established to reduce the time-resolved imaging distortion by 30-40 %. Consequently, the leading intracellular local imaging information is serialized and integrated, which allows comparison to any single time-resolved signal, and leads to a significant improvement of the probing capacity.
Keywords: aggregated state; anti-Kasha's rule; bioimaging; dual emissions; thermally activated delayed fluorescence.
© 2020 Wiley-VCH GmbH.