• click chemistry
• glycoconjugation
• lanthanides
• luminescence
• molecular probes

Our work focuses on the synthesis of new glycoconjugated europium complexes of ligands based on a coordination motif known from the literature, which features a triazacyclononane azamacrocycle bearing charge-transfer antenna with strongly adsorbing p-substituted aryl-alkynyl group.The glycoconjugation approach was chosen to improve the aqueous solubility of the complexes and to make them able to interact with biological structures, such as the GLUTs transporters, which are overexpressed in tumor cells compared to healthy cells, due to the intense glycolytic activity which they perform (Warburg effect). Therefore, glycoconjugation represents a powerful tool to impart selectivity to therapeutic and molecular diagnostic agents, which are important especially in the diagnosis of early stage of cancer. The glycoconjugation was performed through the CuAAC click chemistry reaction.