A fluorescent probe for polarity reveals altered polarity in zebrafish development and serum of cancer patients

Abstract

Cell polarity is one of the fundamental parameters of the microenvironment in vivo. Herein, we designed a near-infrared probe for analyzing the polarity in tissue development and diseases. The probe AN is insensitive to viscosity and highly selective to polarity with large stokes shift. The fluorescence of AN remains stable under the white light illumination for 40 min. Biological imaging experiments using AN indicate that cell polarity is gradually increased during zebrafish development. Furthermore, serologic tests of cancer patients suggest that the blood polarity of patients with gastric cancer is considerably lower than that of healthy individuals. After the tumor excision, the blood polarity of those patients is increased to be close to normal. The results of serologic tests before and after the surgery are in agreement with the observations from the cell imaging experiments where chemotherapeutic agents can significantly increase the polarity of cancer cells. Therefore, the probe AN can be a powerful tool for analyzing the polarity in biological systems, and it might be useful for cancer diagnosis and prognosis.