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A sol-gel based molecular imprint incorporating carbon dots for fluorometric determination of nicotinic acid

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Abstract

We are introducing functionalized carbon dots (C-dots) coated with a shell of molecularly imprinted sol-gel as a new tool in molecular imprint-based detection. Specifically, an imprint recognizing nicotinic acid (NA) was prepared in two steps. The first involves pyrolytic decomposition of citric acid in the presence of aminopropyltriethoxysilane to yield triethoxysilyl-modified C-dots with a typical size of 2.8 ± 1.1 nm. These are then polycondensed in the presence of tetraethoxysilane and NA at room temperature to give spherical silica nanoparticles (SiNPs) with a typical size of ~300 nm and containing C-dots and NA in the silica matrix. NA was then removed by extraction. The resulting SiNPs are well permeable to NA, photostable, display strong blue luminescence and can bind NA fairly selectively. The fluorometric detection scheme is based on the finding that increasing concentrations of NA quench the fluorescence of the C-dots in the SiNPs. NA can be determined by this method in the 0.5 to 10.5 μM concentration range, with a 12.6 nM detection limit. The composite was successfully utilized as a fluorescent probe for the determination of NA in spiked human urine samples. The method is believed to have a wider scope in being applicable to other analytes that are capable of quenching the fluorescence of C-dots.

A new type of nicotinic acid sensitive molecularly imprinted polymers functionalized carbon dots (SiNPs) were fabricated by the sol-gel polymerization. The composite was utilized as a fluorescent probe for the determination of nicotinic acid in human urine samples.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by Graduate Students Innovative Projects of Jiangsu Province (No.CXZZ12_0308). We thank the editors and co-workers for help and constructive suggestions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Central Laboratory, Yishui Central Hospital, Linyi, 276400, China

    Pengli Zuo, Junfa Gao, Jianha Liu, Mingming Zhao & Jiahong Zhao

  2. Department of Analytical Chemistry, China Pharmaceutical University, 24 Tongjia Lane, Nanjing, Jiangsu province, 210009, China

    Jun Peng & Hua He

  3. Key Laboratory of Drug Quality Control and Pharmacovigilance, Ministry of Education, China Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, 210009, China

    Hua He

  4. Laboratory of Chemistry, Yishui NO.4 High School, Linyi, 276400, China

    Pengjian Zuo

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  1. Pengli Zuo
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Correspondence to Hua He.

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Zuo, P., Gao, J., Peng, J. et al. A sol-gel based molecular imprint incorporating carbon dots for fluorometric determination of nicotinic acid. Microchim Acta 183, 329–336 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-015-1630-5

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