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“Switch-on” fluorescence sensing platform based on porphyrin metal-organic frameworks for rapid and specific detection of zinc ion

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Abstract

Zinc ion (Zn2+) is a necessary transition metal ion in the human body and plays a vital role in biological systems. Therefore, it is meaningful for rapid, sensitive, and specific detection of Zn2+. Herein, a “switch-on” fluorescence sensing platform for the detection of Zn2+ was successfully established. In this work, we report an optical nanoprobe with amino functional groups based on porphyrin metal-organic frameworks (PCN-NH2) through a simple treatment method. The modification of the salicylaldehyde (SA) through the C=N acts as a quencher of PCN-NH2 and the ligand of Zn2+ can effectively inhibit the fluorescence emission of PCN-NH2. The complex of porphyrin-based metal-organic framework and salicylaldehyde (PCN/SA) acts as the fluorescence sensing probe. The presence of Zn2+ results in the new emission peak at 448 nm due to the formation of a complex between Zn2+ and SA. The corresponding fluorescence signal changes were used to accurately detect the concentration of Zn2+. The fluorescence sensing platform shows advantages, including rapid response, high sensitivity, and excellent specificity with a linear detection range of Zn2+ between 0.1 and 250 μM, and a low detection limit (LOD) of 0.07 μM. And the feasibility of the method was verified for the quantification of Zn2+ in cell lysate, environmental water, and plasma.

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Acknowledgements

Special thanks are due to the instrumental analysis at the Analytical and Testing Center, Northeastern University.

Funding

This work is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 21974018, 22074011, and 21727811), Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (N2005015 and N2005027), and Liaoning Revitalization Talents Program (XLYC1907191, XLYC1802016).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, College of Sciences, Northeastern University, Shenyang, 110819, Liaoning, China

    Xiao-Ping Zhang, Bo Lin, Yang Shu & Jian-Hua Wang

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  1. Xiao-Ping Zhang
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  2. Bo Lin
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  3. Yang Shu
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  4. Jian-Hua Wang
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Contributions

Xiao-Ping Zhang: literature research, scheme design, data collection and processing, and original draft writing. Bo Lin: literature research and data collection and processing. Yang Shu: scheme design, supervision, original draft writing, reviewing, and editing. Jian-Hua Wang: supervision, original draft writing, reviewing, and editing. All individuals who made contributions to this study are included as authors in this paper.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Yang Shu or Jian-Hua Wang.

Ethics declarations

Human plasma samples of the three volunteers were collected at the Hospital of Northeastern University with the consent of the participants. All the experiments in this work were carried out in compliance with ethical standards and conducted according to the Declaration of Helsinki and approved by the Ethics Committee of Northeastern University (China).

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Zhang, XP., Lin, B., Shu, Y. et al. “Switch-on” fluorescence sensing platform based on porphyrin metal-organic frameworks for rapid and specific detection of zinc ion. Anal Bioanal Chem 413, 5161–5168 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-021-03482-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-021-03482-6

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