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Carbon dots as specific fluorescent sensors for Hg2+ and glutathione imaging

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Abstract

Nitrogen-doped carbon dots (NCDs) have been constructed in which coal washing wastewater is used as carbon precursor, tryptophan is added for nitrogen doping and surface functional together with polyethylene glycol. The nitrogen doping and surface functional with electron rich groups resulted in excellent fluorescent properties regarding stability, reversibility, printability with high quantum yield which not only enable the NCDs as fluorescent ink for advanced message encryption, but also realize specific on-off-on fluorescent sensing of Hg2+ and GSH as solution, hydrogel and filter paper sensors. The NCDs had a linear range of 0.01-100 μM and a detection limit of 6.27 nM (RSD 0.33%) for Hg2+ and the NCDs@Hg2+ had a linear range of 0.01–60 μM and a detection limit of 3.53 nM (RSD 1.53%) for GSH in sensing studies with aqueous solutions. In addition, with the low cytotoxicity and good biocompatibility NCDs have been successfully used for imaging Hg2+ and GSH in living MG-63 cells. The presented NCDs recycle waste coal washing water into worthwhile material which can be implemented as promising anti-counterfeiting and message encryption candidates as well as effective Hg2+ and GSH sensing, tracking and removing tools in complicated environmental and biological systems.

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Acknowledgements

Authors acknowledge Professor Jianli Li and Dr. Mengyao She of Northwest University for their help. This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 22179107, U1903133), Shaanxi Provincial Natural Science Fund Project (No. 2018JQ2061), the Outstanding Youth Science Fund of Xi’an University of Science and Technology (No. 2018YQ3-14).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an, 710054, People’s Republic of China

    Shaobing Zhang, Haidong Yan, Hongni Li, Tiantian Xu, Hui Li, Chengkun Wang, Zheng Yang, Xiaodan Jia & Xiangrong Liu

  2. Key Laboratory of Synthetic and Natural Functional Molecule of the Ministry of Education, College of Chemistry & Materials Science, Northwest University, Xi’an, 710127, People’s Republic of China

    Hui Li & Zheng Yang

  3. Key Laboratory of Coal Resources Exploration and Comprehensive Utilization, Ministry of Land and Resources, Xi’an, 710012, People’s Republic of China

    Zheng Yang, Xiaodan Jia & Xiangrong Liu

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  1. Shaobing Zhang
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Zhang, S., Yan, H., Li, H. et al. Carbon dots as specific fluorescent sensors for Hg2+ and glutathione imaging. Microchim Acta 190, 224 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-023-05805-z

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