Near-Infrared Mitochondria-Targetable Fluorescent Probe for High-Contrast Bioimaging of H2S

To elucidate the complex role of biological H₂S and study the mitochondrial damage and some related diseases, effective methods for visualization of H₂S in mitochondria and in vivo are urgently needed. In this contribution, a novel near-infrared mitochondria-targetable fluorescence probe MI-H₂S for H₂S detection was developed. MI-H₂S shows rapid detection ability for H₂S in pure aqueous solution and outputs a highly selective and sensitive fluorescence-on signal at 663 nm with a large Stokes shift of 141 nm. Bioimaging experiments revealed that the probe has good mitochondrial-targeting ability and high-contrast imaging ability for detecting H₂S in living systems. The probe also showed great potential in the detection of H₂S during inflammation. All of the results demonstrate that MI-H₂S can be applied as an effective probe for the visualization and study of H₂S in mitochondria and in vivo.