Counterion‐Paired Bright Heptamethine Fluorophores with NIR‐II Excitation and Emission Enable Multiplexed Biomedical Imaging
Abstract
Photon excitation and emission at the NIR‐II spectral window enable high‐contrast deep‐tissue bioimaging. However, multiplexed imaging with NIR‐II excitation and emission has been hampered by the limited chemical strategies to develop bright fluorophores with tunable absorption in this spectral regime. Herein, we developed a series of heptamethine cyanines (HCs) with varied absorption/emission maxima spanning from 1100 to 1600 nm through a physical organic approach. A bulky counterion paired to HCs was found to elicit substantial improvements in absorptivity (7‐fold), brightness (14‐fold), and spectral profiles in water, addressing a notorious quenching problem of NIR‐II cyanines due to aggregation and polarization. We demonstrated the utilities of HC1222 and HC1342 for high‐contrast dual‐color imaging of circulatory system, lymphatic structures, tumor, and organ function in living mice under 1120 nm and 1319 nm excitation, showing HCs as a promising platform for non‐invasive bioimaging.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
The contradictory properties between emission wavelength and quantum yield of organic fluorophores typically result in significantly diminished brightness for fluorophores with emission >1100 nm.
“The contradictory properties between emission wavelength and quantum yield of organic fluorophores typically result in significantly diminished brightness for fluorophores with emission >1100 nm85,213.”
From Organic small-molecule NIR-II fluorophores for tumor phototheranostics (2026) · cites this paper as [85]
Cites
In vivo three-photon microscopy of subcortical structures within an intact mouse brain
Horton, N. G., Wang, K., Kobat, D., Clark, C. G., Wise, F. W., Schaffer, C. B., & Xu, C. (2013) · Nature Photonics · doi:10.1038/nphoton.2012.336 · Cited by 1,505 · see citing works
A route to brightly fluorescent carbon nanotubes for near-infrared imaging in mice
Welsher, K., Liu, Z., Sherlock, S. P., Robinson, J. T., Chen, Z., Daranciang, D., & Dai, H. (2009) · Nature Nanotechnology · doi:10.1038/nnano.2009.294 · Cited by 1,287 · see citing works
Molecular Engineering of NIR‐II Fluorophores for Improved Biomedical Detection
Lei, Z., & Zhang, F. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202007040 · Cited by 689 · see citing works
Self-citationNext-generation in vivo optical imaging with short-wave infrared quantum dots
Bruns, O. T., Bischof, T. S., Harris, D. K., Franke, D., Shi, Y., Riedemann, L., Bartelt, A., Jaworski, F. B., Carr, J. A., Rowlands, C. J., et al. (2017) · Nature Biomedical Engineering · doi:10.1038/s41551-017-0056 · Cited by 686 · see citing works
Li, B., Lu, L., Zhao, M., Lei, Z., & Zhang, F. (2018) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.201801226 · Cited by 658 · see citing works
Self-citationA high quantum yield molecule-protein complex fluorophore for near-infrared II imaging
Antaris, A. L., Chen, H., Diao, S., Ma, Z., Zhang, Z., Zhu, S., Wang, J., Lozano, A. X., Fan, Q., Chew, L., et al. (2017) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/ncomms15269 · Cited by 623 · see citing works
Zhong, Y., Ma, Z., Wang, F., Wang, X., Yang, Y., Liu, Y., Zhao, X., Li, J., Du, H., Zhang, M., et al. (2019) · Nature Biotechnology · doi:10.1038/s41587-019-0262-4 · Cited by 575 · see citing works
Self-citationAnti-quenching NIR-II molecular fluorophores for in vivo high-contrast imaging and pH sensing
Wang, S., Fan, Y., Li, D., Sun, C., Lei, Z., Lu, L., Wang, T., & Zhang, F. (2019) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/s41467-019-09043-x · Cited by 510 · see citing works
Self-citationRational Design of Molecular Fluorophores for Biological Imaging in the NIR‐II Window
Yang, Q., Ma, Z., Wang, H., Zhou, B., Zhu, S., Zhong, Y., Wang, J., Wan, H., Antaris, A., Ma, R., et al. (2017) · Advanced Materials · doi:10.1002/adma.201605497 · Cited by 467 · see citing works
Flavylium Polymethine Fluorophores for Near‐ and Shortwave Infrared Imaging
Cosco, E. D., Caram, J. R., Bruns, O. T., Franke, D., Day, R. A., Farr, E. P., Bawendi, M. G., & Sletten, E. M. (2017) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.201706974 · Cited by 415 · see citing works
Organic NIR-II molecule with long blood half-life for in vivo dynamic vascular imaging
Li, B., Zhao, M., Feng, L., Dou, C., Ding, S., Zhou, G., Lu, L., Zhang, H., Chen, F., Li, X., et al. (2020) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/s41467-020-16924-z · Cited by 374 · see citing works
Self-citationCosco, E. D., Spearman, A. L., Ramakrishnan, S., Lingg, J. G. P., Saccomano, M., Pengshung, M., Arús, B. A., Wong, K. C. Y., Glasl, S., Ntziachristos, V., et al. (2020) · Nature Chemistry · doi:10.1038/s41557-020-00554-5 · Cited by 343 · see citing works
Tao, Z., Hong, G., Shinji, C., Chen, C., Diao, S., Antaris, A. L., Zhang, B., Zou, Y., & Dai, H. (2013) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.201307346 · Cited by 330 · see citing works
A hybrid erbium(III)–bacteriochlorin near-infrared probe for multiplexed biomedical imaging
Wang, T., Wang, S., Liu, Z., He, Z., Yu, P., Zhao, M., Zhang, H., Lu, L., Wang, Z., Wang, Z., et al. (2021) · Nature Materials · doi:10.1038/s41563-021-01063-7 · Cited by 308 · see citing works
Self-citationUpconversion NIR-II fluorophores for mitochondria-targeted cancer imaging and photothermal therapy
Zhou, H., Zeng, X., Li, A., Zhou, W., Tang, L., Hu, W., Fan, Q., Meng, X., Deng, H., Duan, L., et al. (2020) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/s41467-020-19945-w · Cited by 289 · see citing works
NIR-II bioluminescence for in vivo high contrast imaging and in situ ATP-mediated metastases tracing
Lu, L., Li, B., Ding, S., Fan, Y., Wang, S., Sun, C., Zhao, M., Zhao, C.-X., & Zhang, F. (2020) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/s41467-020-18051-1 · Cited by 274 · see citing works
Self-citationRen, T., Wang, Z., Xiang, Z., Lu, P., Lai, H., Yuan, L., Zhang, X., & Tan, W. (2021) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202009986 · Cited by 273 · see citing works
Molecular Fluorophores for Deep-Tissue Bioimaging
Wang, S., Li, B., & Zhang, F. (2020) · ACS Central Science · doi:10.1021/acscentsci.0c00544 · Cited by 268 · see citing works
Self-citationConstitutional Isomerization Enables Bright NIR‐II AIEgen for Brain‐Inflammation Imaging
Liu, S., Chen, C., Li, Y., Zhang, H., Liu, J., Wang, R., Wong, S. T. H., Lam, J. W. Y., Ding, D., & Tang, B. Z. (2019) · Advanced Functional Materials · doi:10.1002/adfm.201908125 · Cited by 266 · see citing works
Tao, Z., Hong, G., Shinji, C., Chen, C., Diao, S., Antaris, A. L., Zhang, B., Zou, Y., & Dai, H. (2013) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.201307346 · Cited by 239 · see citing works
Light-sheet microscopy in the near-infrared II window
Wang, F., Wan, H., Ma, Z., Zhong, Y., Sun, Q., Tian, Y., Qu, L., Du, H., Zhang, M., Li, L., et al. (2019) · Nature Methods · doi:10.1038/s41592-019-0398-7 · Cited by 237 · see citing works
Meng, X., Zhang, J., Sun, Z., Zhou, L., Deng, G., Li, S., Li, W., Gong, P., & Cai, L. (2018) · Theranostics · doi:10.7150/thno.26607 · Cited by 231 · see citing works
Collective fluorescence switching of counterion-assembled dyes in polymer nanoparticles
Reisch, A., Didier, P., Richert, L., Oncul, S., Arntz, Y., Mély, Y., & Klymchenko, A. S. (2014) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/ncomms5089 · Cited by 226 · see citing works
Fang, Y., Shang, J., Liu, D., Shi, W., Li, X., & Ma, H. (2020) · Journal of the American Chemical Society · doi:10.1021/jacs.0c08187 · Cited by 223 · see citing works
Xanthene-Based NIR-II Dyes for <i>In Vivo</i> Dynamic Imaging of Blood Circulation
Liu, D., He, Z., Zhao, Y., Yang, Y., Shi, W., Li, X., & Ma, H. (2021) · Journal of the American Chemical Society · doi:10.1021/jacs.1c07711 · Cited by 217 · see citing works
Self-citationDing, B., Xiao, Y., Zhou, H., Zhang, X., Qu, C., Xu, F., Deng, Z., Cheng, Z., & Hong, X. (2019) · Journal of Medicinal Chemistry · doi:10.1021/acs.jmedchem.8b01682 · Cited by 215 · see citing works
Bouit, P., Aronica, C., Toupet, L., et al. (2010) · Journal of the American Chemical Society · doi:10.1021/ja9100886 · Cited by 208 · see citing works
Li, T., Li, C., Ruan, Z., Xu, P., Yang, X., Yuan, P., Wang, Q., & Yan, L. (2019) · ACS Nano · doi:10.1021/acsnano.9b00452 · Cited by 202 · see citing works
Beyond the Cyanine Limit: Peierls Distortion and Symmetry Collapse in a Polymethine Dye
Tolbert, L. M., & Zhao, X. (1997) · Journal of the American Chemical Society · doi:10.1021/ja9626953 · Cited by 191 · see citing works
Cosco, E. D., Arús, B. A., Spearman, A. L., Atallah, T. L., Lim, I., Leland, O. S., Caram, J. R., Bischof, T. S., Bruns, O. T., & Sletten, E. M. (2021) · Journal of the American Chemical Society · doi:10.1021/jacs.0c11599 · Cited by 183 · see citing works
Zhang, X., Chen, Y., He, H., Wang, S., Lei, Z., & Zhang, F. (2021) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202109728 · Cited by 176 · see citing works
Self-citationFluorination Enhances NIR‐II Fluorescence of Polymer Dots for Quantitative Brain Tumor Imaging
Liu, Y., Liu, J., Chen, D., Wang, X., Zhang, Z., Yang, Y., Jiang, L., Qi, W., Ye, Z., He, S., et al. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202007886 · Cited by 173 · see citing works
Self-citationLing, S., Yang, X., Li, C., Zhang, Y., Yang, H., Chen, G., & Wang, Q. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202000947 · Cited by 156 · see citing works
Li, B., Lu, L., Zhao, M., Lei, Z., & Zhang, F. (2018) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.201801226 · Cited by 137 · see citing works
Self-citationLiu, M., Zhang, Z., Yang, Y., & Chan, Y. (2021) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202011914 · Cited by 134 · see citing works
Self-citationDeciphering the Structure–Property Relations in Substituted Heptamethine Cyanines
Štacková, L., Muchová, E., Russo, M., Slavı́ček, P., Štacko, P., & Petr Klán, A. (2020) · The Journal of Organic Chemistry · doi:10.1021/acs.joc.0c01104 · Cited by 105 · see citing works
Eskandari, M., Roldao, J. C., Cerezo, J., Milián‐Medina, B., & Gierschner, J. (2020) · Journal of the American Chemical Society · doi:10.1021/jacs.9b10686 · Cited by 89 · see citing works
NIR-II fluorescence in vivo confocal microscopy with aggregation-induced emission dots
Yu, W., Guo, B., Zhang, H., Zhou, J., Yu, X., Zhu, L. J., Xue, D., Liu, W., Sun, X., & Qian, J. (2019) · 中国科学通报:英文版 · doi:10.1016/j.scib.2019.02.019 · Cited by 85 · see citing works
In vivo NIR-II structured-illumination light-sheet microscopy
Wang, F., Ma, Z., Zhong, Y., Salazar, F., Xu, C., Ren, F., Qu, L., Wu, A. M., & Dai, H. (2021) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.2023888118 · Cited by 85 · see citing works
Xia, F., Gevers, M., Fognini, A., Mok, A. T. Y., Li, B., Akbari, N., Zadeh, I. E., Qin-Dregely, J., & Xu, C. (2021) · ACS Photonics · doi:10.1021/acsphotonics.1c01018 · Cited by 68 · see citing works
Ultrabright NIR‐II Emissive Polymer Dots for Metastatic Ovarian Cancer Detection
Zhou, X., Liu, Q., Yuan, W., Li, Z., Xu, Y., Feng, W., Xu, C., & Li, F. (2020) · Advanced Science · doi:10.1002/advs.202000441 · Cited by 67 · see citing works
Flavylium Polymethine Fluorophores for Near‐ and Shortwave Infrared Imaging
Cosco, E. D., Caram, J. R., Bruns†, O. T., Franke, D., Day, R. A., Farr, E. P., Bawendi, M. G., & Sletten, E. M. (2017) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.201706974 · Cited by 65 · see citing works
Molecular Engineering of NIR‐II Fluorophores for Improved Biomedical Detection
Lei, Z., & Zhang, F. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.202007040 · Cited by 63 · see citing works
Self-citationCheng, Q., Tian, Y., Dang, H., Teng, C., Xie, K., Yin, D., & Yan, L. (2021) · Advanced Healthcare Materials · doi:10.1002/adhm.202101697 · Cited by 54 · see citing works
Ren, T., Wang, Z., Xiang, Z., Peng, L. J., Lai, H., Yuan, L., Zhang, X., & Tan, W. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.202009986 · Cited by 47 · see citing works
Photophysical Tuning of Shortwave Infrared Flavylium Heptamethine Dyes via Substituent Placement
Pengshung, M., Li, J., Mukadum, F., Lopez, S. A., & Sletten, E. M. (2020) · Organic Letters · doi:10.1021/acs.orglett.0c02213 · Cited by 42 · see citing works
A thiopyrylium salt for PET/NIR‐II tumor imaging and image‐guided surgery
Zhang, X., Ding, B., Qu, C., Li, H., Sun, Y., Gai, Y., Chen, H., Fang, H., Qian, K., Zhang, Y., et al. (2020) · Molecular Oncology · doi:10.1002/1878-0261.12674 · Cited by 33 · see citing works
Zhang, X., Chen, Y., He, H., Wang, S., Lei, Z., & Zhang, F. (2021) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.202109728 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
Self-citationFluorination Enhances NIR‐II Fluorescence of Polymer Dots for Quantitative Brain Tumor Imaging
Liu, Y., Liu, J., Chen, D., Wang, X., Zhang, Z., Yang, Y., Jiang, L., Qi, W., Ye, Z., He, S., et al. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.202007886 · Cited by 22 · see citing works
Self-citationLing, S., Yang, X., Li, C., Zhang, Y., Yang, H., Chen, G., & Wang, Q. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.202000947 · Cited by 15 · see citing works
Liu, M.-H., Zhang, Z., Yang, Y., & Chan, Y. (2020) · Angewandte Chemie · doi:10.1002/ange.202011914 · Cited by 10 · see citing works
Self-citation
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Song, S., Wang, Y., Zhao, Y., Huang, W., Zhang, F., Zhu, S., Wu, Q., Fu, S., Tang, B. Z., & Wang, D. (2022) · Matter · doi:10.1016/j.matt.2022.06.030 · Cited by 133 · see citing works
Self-citationMa, D., Bian, H., Gu, M., Wang, L., Chen, X., & Peng, X. (2024) · Coordination Chemistry Reviews · doi:10.1016/j.ccr.2024.215677 · Cited by 124 · see citing works
Wan, Y., Chen, W., Liu, Y., Lee, K., Gao, Y., Zhang, D., Li, Y., Huang, Z., Luo, J., Lee, C., et al. (2024) · Advanced Materials · doi:10.1002/adma.202405966 · Cited by 90 · see citing works
Tian, Y., Chen, Z., Liu, S., Wu, F., Cao, W., Pang, D., & Xiong, H. (2023) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202309768 · Cited by 57 · see citing works
Song, Y., Tong, X., Han, Y., & Zhang, Q. (2025) · Aggregate · doi:10.1002/agt2.680 · Cited by 47 · see citing works
Liu, Y., Zhang, Z., Hou, X., Ding, Q., Zeng, S., Shen, H., Gong, W., Ding, T., Mahmood, Z., Zeng, X., et al. (2025) · Advanced Materials · doi:10.1002/adma.202420006 · Cited by 30 · see citing works
Ou, Y., Xiang, H., Yang, X., Wang, R., Huan, S., Yuan, L., Ren, T., & Zhang, X. (2025) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.202423978 · Cited by 29 · see citing works
Zhang, X., Li, L., Ren, Y., Li, M., & Tang, Y. (2025) · Advanced Functional Materials · doi:10.1002/adfm.202413341 · Cited by 26 · see citing works
Gao, X., Wang, J.-Y., Qin, Y., Zhu, Y., Liu, Y.-J., Zhou, K., & Cui, M. (2025) · Analytical Chemistry · doi:10.1021/acs.analchem.4c05794 · Cited by 20 · see citing works
Organic small-molecule NIR-II fluorophores for tumor phototheranostics
Xiang, D., Wang, Z., Zheng, H., Tang, Y., & Li, Q. (2026) · Light: Science & Applications · doi:10.1038/s41377-026-02212-w · Cited by 22 · see citing works
“…emission luminogens (AIEgens), and its emission extended beyond 1600 nm. NIR-920 NPs The contradictory properties between emission wave-length and quantum yield of organic fl uorophores typically result in signi fi cantly diminished brightness for fl uorophores with emission >1100 nm 85,213 .”
- Authors
- Yang, Y., Sun, C., Wang, S., Yan, K., Zhao, M., Wu, B., & Zhang, F.
- Affiliations
- Fudan University (CN)
- Corresponding author
- Wang, Shangfeng
- Zhang, Fan
- Venue
- Angewandte Chemie International Edition
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2022-04-12
- Volume
- 61
- Issue
- 24
- Pages
- e202117436-e202117436
- ISSN
- 1433-7851 (ISSN-L)
- 1521-3773
- OpenAlex
- W4220988351
- Cited by
- 139
- References
- 51
- Citations by year
- 2026: 22 · 2025: 38 · 2024: 37 · 2023: 28 · 2022: 14
- FWCI
- 8.22
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Angewandte Chemie International Edition (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Natural Science Foundation of China (22088101, 21725502, 51961145403, 21904023, 21908030, 22004018)
- Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (20JC1411700, 19490713100, 20490710600, 20S31903700)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Materials Chemistry › Luminescence and Fluorescent Materials
- Physical Sciences › Chemistry › Spectroscopy › Molecular Sensors and Ion Detection
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Imaging › Optical Imaging and Spectroscopy Techniques
- Keywords
- heptamethine cyanine, NIR-II fluorophores, fluorescence intensity, tunable absorption, deep tissue imaging, dual-color imaging, lymphatic imaging, tumor imaging
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Fluorescent Dyes, Ionophores, Neoplasms, Photons, Mice, Optical Imaging
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review