Development of selective fluorescence neurosensor for neurotransmitter monitoring in live cells

Abstract

In the central nervous system, neurotransmitters are responsible for transferring signals from pre-synaptic vesicles to post-synaptic receptors. The most abundant amino acid in brain, glutamate, is a primary excitatory neurotransmitter which plays a major role in regulating many functions in human body such as memory, learning, and long-term depression. Fluorescence approaches as a noninvasive tool provides high spatial resolution in compared with other conventional methods for neurotransmitter detection. Over the last few years, various optical probes have been reported for neurotransmitters sensing, however, they usually suffer from lack of selectivity. In this work, we plan to develop a turn on fluorescence sensor based on coumarin-3- aldehyde scaffold to selectively recognize gamma-amino acids neurotransmitters like glutamate and GABA in live cells. This neurosensor binds to the analyte through formation an iminium ion and a boronate ester. In this sensor, the distance between aldehyde functional group and boronic acid group can only fit larger gamma-amino acids over other alpha-amino acids.