The brain is the central control hub of the whole body. Hence, the consequences of brain diseases can be lethal. Despite the progress in fundamental and clinical research, several key obstacles remain to be addressed. As an emerging science, aggregation-induced emission (AIE) has attracted great interest in the past few years owing to the overwhelming advantages of AIE luminogens (AIEgens), including their emission wavelength, quantum yield, spatial resolution, photosensitivity, photostability, signal-to-noise ratio, and biocompatibility. Herein, we provide a comprehensive summary of AIEgen applications in brain science, including health evaluation, disease detection, diagnosis, imaging, and therapeutics. The review has been summarized into five sections: i) Penetration of AIEgen-based nanomaterials across biological barriers; ii) Detection and diagnosis of brain diseases with AIEgen; iii) Bioimaging of the brain structure in health and disease with AIEgen; iv) Therapeutics for specific diseases in the brain using AIEgen; v) Future outlooks surrounding the applications of AIEgens in the brain. We hope that this review will promote a deeper understanding of the use of AIEgens in the neuroscience community and inspire additional research aimed at improving the current situation in the clinic.

大脑是整个身体的中央控制枢纽。因此，脑部疾病的后果可能是致命的。尽管基础和临床研究取得了进展，但仍有几个关键障碍有待解决。作为一门新兴科学，聚集诱导发光（AIE）由于其发光波长、量子产率、空间分辨率、光敏性、光稳定性、信号-噪声比和生物相容性。在此，我们全面总结了 AIEgen 在脑科学中的应用，包括健康评估、疾病检测、诊断、成像和治疗。综述分为五个部分：i）基于 AIEgen 的纳米材料跨越生物屏障的渗透；ii) 用AIEgen检测和诊断脑部疾病；iii) 使用 AIEgen 对健康和疾病中的大脑结构进行生物成像；iv) 使用 AIEgen 治疗大脑中的特定疾病；v) 围绕 AIEgens 在大脑中的应用的未来展望。我们希望这篇综述能够促进神经科学界对 AIEgens 使用的更深入了解，并激发旨在改善临床现状的更多研究。