Research Progress of Near-Infrared Fluorescent Surgical Navigation Probes

Near-infrared fluorescence (NIRF) imaging technology has been proved to be an effective method for locating tumor sites, identifying tumor boundaries, and distinguishing tumor cells from normal tissues in surgery. The development of high-quality NIRF probes is crucial for the complete elimination of tumors. However, traditional fluorescent probes can produce fluorescence signals in both cancer tissues and healthy tissues and have no cancer targeting, which lead to relatively high background signals and poor specificity. People have gradually developed fluorescent probes with more clinical transformation value through nano-modification, coupling tumor targeting ligands and biomarker activation, etc. In addition, near-infrared (NIR-II) fluorescent probes have gradually become a research hotspot. This review focuses on the structure and properties of fluorescent probes for fluorescence-based surgical navigation. At the same time, passive targeting, active targeting, activating fluorescent probes and NIR-II fluorescent probes are comprehensively described, and the challenges are analyzed. Possible solutions are discussed in order to promote the clinical application of near-infrared fluorescence-based surgical navigation technology.