LAUSR

The discrimination of glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) is a challenging task but of great importance to ensure their safe use in clinics. Herein, four supramolecular AIE nanoassemblies denoted as PDDA-TPE100, PDDA-TPE75, PDDA-TPE50 and PDDA-TPE25 were synthesized by loading different amounts of a negatively charged AIEgen TPE onto the surface of a positively charged polymer PDDA. These AIE nanoassemblies were utilized for the construction of a fluorescent sensor array, which was able to discriminate various GAGs based on a compaction to displacement reaction mechanism. LDA and HCA results revealed that GAGs including Hep, Chs, HA, CTS, DS and OSCS can be discriminated with 100% accuracy. The four-sensor array was then simplified to a three-sensor array using PDDA-TPE100, PDDA-TPE75 and PDDA-TPE50 as the sensors, which was determined to be still powerful in discriminating various GAGs, accurate identification of unknown GAG samples, sensitive detection of trace OSCS contaminant in Hep and identifying Hep and other biological abundant anions. Moreover, the three-sensor array was even successfully applied for differentiating GAGs in serum media.