AIEgens for microbial detection and antimicrobial therapy

Haotian Bai; Wei He; Joe H C Chau; Zheng Zheng; Ryan T K Kwok; Jacky W Y Lam; Ben Zhong Tang

doi:10.1016/j.biomaterials.2020.120598

AIEgens for microbial detection and antimicrobial therapy

Biomaterials. 2021 Jan:268:120598. doi: 10.1016/j.biomaterials.2020.120598. Epub 2020 Dec 8.

Authors

Haotian Bai¹, Wei He², Joe H C Chau¹, Zheng Zheng¹, Ryan T K Kwok², Jacky W Y Lam², Ben Zhong Tang³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Department of Chemistry, Hong Kong Branch of Chinese National Engineering Research Center for Tissue Restoration and Reconstruction and SCUT-HKUST Joint Research Laboratory, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.
² Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Department of Chemistry, Hong Kong Branch of Chinese National Engineering Research Center for Tissue Restoration and Reconstruction and SCUT-HKUST Joint Research Laboratory, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China; HKUST-Shenzhen Research Institute, No. 9 Yuexing 1st RD, South Area, Hi-tech Park Nanshan, Shenzhen, 518057, China.
³ Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Department of Chemistry, Hong Kong Branch of Chinese National Engineering Research Center for Tissue Restoration and Reconstruction and SCUT-HKUST Joint Research Laboratory, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China; HKUST-Shenzhen Research Institute, No. 9 Yuexing 1st RD, South Area, Hi-tech Park Nanshan, Shenzhen, 518057, China; Center for Aggregation-Induced Emission and State Key Laboratory of Luminescent Materials and Devices, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, 510640, China. Electronic address: tangbenz@ust.hk.

PMID: 33321291
DOI: 10.1016/j.biomaterials.2020.120598

Abstract

Pathogenic microbes can cause infections or diseases in hosts and they pose ongoing threats to human health. Antibiotics have been taken an active role in treating a wide variety of infections or diseases since they were first introduced in the 1940s. However, the emergence of antibiotic-resistant microbes makes these previously effective drugs invalid regrettably. So it is urgently needed to accelerate research and development for new antimicrobial systems and strategies. Recently, luminogens with aggregation-induced emission characteristics (AIEgens) have emerged as powerful fluorescent tools for microbial detection and antimicrobial therapy. In this review, we highlighted the latest advancements of AIEgen-based biofunctional materials and systems in this research field. AIE fluorescent probes have the advantages of excellent sensitivity and rapid response, which make them useful for ultrafast bacterial imaging, bacteria classification, and pathogen discrimination. Early microbial detection and identification could help us study the mechanism of antibiotic resistance more scientifically. Moreover, the AIEgens-based photosensitizers (AIE-PSs) with strong photosensitization show good performance on the efficient elimination of multidrug-resistant bacteria and intracellular bacteria. At the end of the review, a short perspective on aggregate science is concluded.

Keywords: Aggregate meso-science; Aggregation-induced emission; Intracellular bacteria; Microbial detection; Multidrug-resistant bacteria; Photodynamic therapy.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Review

MeSH terms

Anti-Bacterial Agents / pharmacology
Anti-Bacterial Agents / therapeutic use
Anti-Infective Agents* / pharmacology
Drug Resistance, Multiple, Bacterial
Fluorescent Dyes
Humans
Photosensitizing Agents* / pharmacology

Substances

Anti-Bacterial Agents
Anti-Infective Agents
Fluorescent Dyes
Photosensitizing Agents