Refine
Has Fulltext
- yes (3)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (3) (remove)
Year of publication
- 2021 (3) (remove)
Document Type
- Journal article (3)
Language
- English (3) (remove)
Keywords
- DNA/RNA sensors (1)
- Raman probes (1)
- boranes (1)
- boronate ester (1)
- borylation (1)
- chromophores (1)
- cross-coupling (1)
- fluorescent probes (1)
- fluoroarene (1)
- inorganic chemistry (1)
Institute
We report four new luminescent tetracationic bis-triarylborane DNA and RNA sensors that show high binding affinities, in several cases even in the nanomolar range. Three of the compounds contain substituted, highly emissive and structurally flexible bis(2,6-dimethylphenyl-4-ethynyl)arene linkers (3: arene=5,5′-2,2′-bithiophene; 4: arene=1,4-benzene; 5: arene=9,10-anthracene) between the two boryl moieties and serve as efficient dual Raman and fluorescence chromophores. The shorter analogue 6 employs 9,10-anthracene as the linker and demonstrates the importance of an adequate linker length with a certain level of flexibility by exhibiting generally lower binding affinities than 3–5. Pronounced aggregation–deaggregation processes are observed in fluorimetric titration experiments with DNA for compounds 3 and 5. Molecular modelling of complexes of 5 with AT-DNA, suggest the minor groove as the dominant binding site for monomeric 5, but demonstrate that dimers of 5 can also be accommodated. Strong SERS responses for 3–5 versus a very weak response for 6, particularly the strong signals from anthracene itself observed for 5 but not for 6, demonstrate the importance of triple bonds for strong Raman activity in molecules of this compound class. The energy of the characteristic stretching vibration of the C≡C bonds is significantly dependent on the aromatic moiety between the triple bonds. The insertion of aromatic moieties between two C≡C bonds thus offers an alternative design for dual Raman and fluorescence chromophores, applicable in multiplex biological Raman imaging.
Two N-methylpyridinium compounds and analogous N-protonated salts of 2- and 2,7-substituted 4-pyridyl-pyrene compounds were synthesised and their crystal structures, photophysical properties both in solution and in the solid state, electrochemical and spectroelectrochemical properties were studied. Upon methylation or protonation, the emission maxima are significantly bathochromically shifted compared to the neutral compounds, although the absorption maxima remain almost unchanged. As a result, the cationic compounds show very large apparent Stokes shifts of up to 7200 cm\(^{-1}\). The N-methylpyridinium compounds have a single reduction at ca. −1.5 V vs. Fc/Fc\(^+\) in MeCN. While the reduction process was reversible for the 2,7-disubstituted compound, it was irreversible for the mono-substituted one. Experimental findings are complemented by DFT and TD-DFT calculations. Furthermore, the N-methylpyridinium compounds show strong interactions with calf thymus (ct)-DNA, presumably by intercalation, which paves the way for further applications of these multi-functional compounds as potential DNA-bioactive agents.
Catalytic C−X borylation of aryl halides containing two ortho‐fluorines has been found to be challenging, as most previous methods require stoichiometric amounts of base and the polyfluorinated aryl boronates suffer from protodeboronation, which is accelerated by ortho‐fluorine substituents. Herein, we report that a combination of Pd(dba)2 (dba=dibenzylideneacetone) with SPhos (2‐dicyclohexylphosphino‐2’,6’‐dimethoxybiphenyl) as a ligand is efficient to catalyze the C‐Cl borylation of aryl chlorides containing two ortho‐fluorine substituents. This method, conducted under base‐free conditions, is compatible with the resulting di‐ortho‐fluorinated aryl boronate products which are sensitive to base.