A water-soluble two-photon ratiometric triarylboron probe with nucleolar targeting by preferential RNA binding

Abstract

By functionalizing triarylboron with cyclen, we developed a two-photon fluorescence probe, TAB-2, which can selectively bind RNA with a ratiometric readout. We tested TAB-2 in NIH/3T3 fibroblast cells, and demonstrated its capability in visualizing nucleoli and analyzing microenvironment polarity by two-photon and fluorescence-lifetime imaging microscopy.