Chromatic covalent organic frameworks enabling in-vivo chemical tomography.

Abstract

Covalent organic frameworks designed as chromatic sensors offer opportunities to probe biological interfaces, particularly when combined with biocompatible matrices. Particularly compelling is the prospect of chemical tomography - or the 3D spatial mapping of chemical detail within the complex environment of living systems. Herein, we demonstrate a chromic Covalent Organic Framework (COF) integrated within silk fibroin (SF) microneedles that probe plant vasculature, sense the alkalization of vascular fluid as a biomarker for drought stress, and provide a 3D in-vivo mapping of chemical gradients using smartphone technology. A series of Schiff base COFs with tunable pKa ranging from 5.6 to 7.6 enable conical, optically transparent SF microneedles with COF coatings of 120 to 950 nm to probe vascular fluid and the surrounding tissues of tobacco and tomato plants. The conical design allows for 3D mapping of the chemical environment (such as pH) at standoff distances from the plant, enabling in-vivo chemical tomography. Chromatic COF sensors of this type will enable multidimensional chemical mapping of previously inaccessible and complex environments.

Plant phenotyping relevance

植物維管束のpH変化を乾燥ストレスの指標として測定し、COFマイクロニードルとスマートフォンによる3D化学マッピング手法を開発しているため、植物表現型取得法が中心です。

Code and data availability

The paper reports plant-phenotyping measurements (in-vivo pH tomography in tobacco/tomato leaves, drought-stress biomarker data) and image-analysis workflows (ImageJ-based CIELAB/ΔE to pH map conversion), but no authors' public repository, code deposit, or dataset URL is stated. The data availability statement says raw

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