Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Fluorogenic Atom Transfer Radical Polymerization In Aqueous Media As A Strategy For Detection, Zachary T. Allen, Jemima R. Sackey-Addo, Madeline P. Hopps, Danyal Tahseen, Joseph T. Anderson, Tyler A. Graf, Christina B. Cooley

Chemistry Faculty Research

The development of novel approaches to signal amplification in aqueous media could enable new diagnostic platforms for the detection of water-soluble analytes, including biomolecules. This paper describes a fluorogenic polymerization approach to amplify initiator signal by the detection of visible fluorescence upon polymerization in real-time. Fluorogenic monomers were synthesized and co-polymerized by atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) in water to reveal increasing polymer fluorescence as a function of both reaction time and initiator concentration. Optimization of the fluorogenic ATRP reaction conditions allowed for the quantitative detection of a small-molecule initiator as a model analyte over a broad linear concentration range …