Area of research
Materials Chemistry · Biomedical Engineering
Research interest
Research topics from publications: NIR-Absorbing Tetraphenylethene-Containing bisBODIPY Nanoplatforms Demonstrate Effective Lysosome-Targeting and Combinational Phototherapy; Development of BODIPY dyes with versatile functional groups at 3,5-positions from diacyl peroxides via Cu(ii)-catalyzed radical alkylation. Representative work: Photosensitizer-based phototherapies, including photodynamic therapy (PDT) and photothermal therapy (PTT), offer safe treatment modalities for tumor ablation with spatiotemporal precision. After photons are absorbed, PDT creates localized chemical damage by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS), while PTT induces localized thermal damage. However, PDT still faces hypoxic tumor challenges, while PTT encounters issues related to heat resistance and potential overheating. The combination of PDT and PTT shows great potential as an effective anticancer strategy. By targeting lysosomes with carefully designed phototherapeutic reagents for combined phototherapy, rapid dysfunction and cell death An efficient Cu(ii)-catalyzed, C-H alkylation of BODIPY with a variety of alkyl diacyl peroxides has been developed for the first time, providing a late-stage and straightforward method for controllable synthesis of monoalkylated and dialkylated BODIPYs via a radical process that otherwise is difficult to obtain by literature methods. This chemo- and site-selective transformation will allow for the introduction of a variety of functionalities on the BODIPY core for highly versatile tethering to receptors and to other molecules of interest