Deep eutectic solvent-assisted preparation of resveratrol-based carbon dots with high biocompatibility for in situ screening inhibitors on amyloid protein aggregation and scavenging reactive oxygen species

It is important to monitor the aggregation process of amyloid protein for fundamental researches, diagnosis and drug development of the related diseases, like neurodegenerative and metabolic diseases. Resveratrol (Res) has attracted great attention due to its high medical values. However, the application of Res is seriously restricted, because of its poor bioavailability caused by low water solubility and poor absorption. To address the problem, for the first time, this study put forward a novel strategy to nano-derivatize Res to carbon dots, i.e. Res-DES-CDs, based on the ternary deep eutectic solvent (DES). DES played the roles to assist the solubility and carbonization of Res, and improve biocompatibility. Res-DES-CDs possessed the highest water compatibility as reported so far for Res related derivatives. Meanwhile, Res-DES-CDs retained some functionalities of Res, thus exhibiting the turn-on fluorescence probing ability towards amyloid fibrils without disturbing amyloid aggregation; it was applicable to in situ screen aggregation inhibitors in real time. In addition, Res-DES-CDs possessed better ability of scavenging reactive oxygen species than Res, but with lower cytotoxicity and higher cell uptake rate, which held a promise to alleviate oxidative stress in relative diseases. The proposed strategy could be generalized to enhance water solubility and biocompatibility of compounds of poor solubility.