Side-Chain Engineering of Aggregation-Induced Emission Molecules for Boosting Cancer Phototheranostics

The ingenious construction of versatile cancer phototheranostic agents involving FLI, PDT, and PTT concurrently has attracted great interest. By virtue of the plentiful freely rotated moieties and the inherent twisted structure, AIEgens have been proven a perfect template for development of phototheranostic system. The systematic regulation of the energy consumption pathways through altering the molecular structure of AIEgens based on side-chain engineering is of great significance for the simultaneous pursuit of controllable fluorescence, photodynamic and photothermal properties, but has rarely been reported. Herein, an AIE-active multifunctional phototheranostic system was reported through intentional control the side-chain structure. Bearing the longest alkyl chain, all of those three energy dissipation pathways were retained controllably. In vitro and in vivo evaluations verified that TBFT2 nanoparticles performed well in terms of FLI-guided PDT and PTT synergistic cancer therapy. This study provides a new insight into the exploration of superior versatile phototheranostics through side-chain engineering.