Fluorescent copolymers with aggregation-induced emission feature from a novel catalyst-free three-component tandem polymerization

Abstract

The synthesis of amphiphilic fluorescent copolymers with aggregation-induced emission (AIE) feature has attracted great research attention for their practical applications especially in the biomedical fields. It is well known that the amphiphilic copolymers containing AIE fluorogens (AIEgens) could self-assemble into fluorescent polymeric nanoparticles (FPNs) and result in the aggregation of hydrophobic AIEgens and could effectively overcome the aggregation-caused quenching (ACQ) effect of many conventional organic dyes. In this work, we develop a novel one-pot three-component tandem polymerization to synthesize amphipathic poly(PEGDA-co-TPE) copolymers based on a catalyst-free Passerini reaction, which could be occurred under rather mild experimental conditions. A series of detailed analyses reveal that AIE-active poly(PEGDA-co-TPE) FPNs have many advantages, such as strong fluorescence with a high quantum yield of 38.3% in water, large Stokes shift (>130 nm), remarkable water dispersibility, great photostability and excellent biocompatibility. The in vitro experiments disclose that the poly(PEGDA-co-TPE) FPNs are promising fluorescent agents for bioimaging applications.