Lighting up cells with lanthanide self-assembled helicates

Lanthanide bioprobes and bioconjugates are ideal luminescent stains in view of their low propensity to photobleaching, sharp emission lines and long excited state lifetimes permitting time-resolved detection for enhanced sensitivity. We show here how the interplay between physical, chemical and biochemical properties allied to microfluidics engineering leads to self-assembled dinuclear lanthanide luminescent probes illuminating live cells and selectively detecting biomarkers expressed by cancerous human breast cells