A Boron Dipyrromethene (BODIPY)-Based CuII-Bipyridine Complex for Highly Selective NO Detection

A BODIPY-containing Cu-II-bipyridine complex for the simple selective fluorogenic detection of NO in air and in live cells is reported. The detection mechanism is based on NO-promoted Cu-II to Cu-I reduction, followed by demetallation of the complex, which results in the clearly enhanced emission of the boron dipyrromethene (BODIPY) unit.