Tunable AIE-Active Assemblies Inducing Bacterial Agglutination toward Noninvasive Photodynamic Antiseptic

Aggregation-induced emission (AIE) photosensitizer assemblies capable of inducing bacterial agglutination were fabricated to achieve a high PDT efficacy in a noninvasive manner. An AIE-active molecule CTRA was designed to bear the donor and acceptor subunits for singlet oxygen (1O2) generation. An amphiphile DGal with a β-d-galactose headgroup was introduced to coassemble for the photosensitizer assemblies bearing glycosyls for bacteria capture as well as to tune the 1O2 generation of CTRA. At the optimal combination of two components, a highly efficient noninvasive PDT activity with nearly 100% effectiveness against S. aureus was realized.