An azidocoumarin-based fluorescent probe for imaging lysosomal hydrogen sulfide in living cells

Abstract

A commercially available fluorescent hydrogen sulfide (H₂S) probe 7-azido-4-methylcoumarin (AzMC) was developed into its lysosome-targeted counterpart Lyso-C via a four-step synthetic approach. Lyso-C displayed fast response (within 5 min), excellent sensitivity (with a detection limit of 37 nM) and high selectivity toward H₂S. More importantly, Lyso-C was successfully applied to imaging lysosomal H₂S and showed potential capability to quantitatively detect H₂S in living cells.