Triazole-containing BODIPY dyes as novel fluorescent probes for soluble oligomers of amyloid Aβ1–42 peptide

A straightforward functionalization of BODIPY dyes via incorporation of a triazole moiety produced fluorescent dyes that were capable of distinguishing between secondary structure conformations of soluble oligomeric species of Aβ1–42 peptide. Small concentrations of the dyes, relative to Aβ1–42, provided up to an 8-fold and 35-fold fluorescence increase in the presence of the unordered and ordered, β-sheet-rich conformations of soluble Aβ1–42 oligomers, respectively. These triazole-containing dyes could prove to be useful probes for monitoring amyloid conformational transitions in vitro.