A hemicyanine-based turn-on fluorescent probe for the selective detection of Cu2+ions and imaging in living cells

A novel hemicyanine-based fluorescent probe was developed for the fast, selective, and reversible detection of Cu(2+)ions with turn-on fluorescence response in the aqueous solution. The sensing mode was demonstrated through fluorescence, UV-vis, HRMS,H-1 NMR, and DFT calculations. The probe was successfully used for the imaging of Cu(2+)ions in living cells.