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Highly passivated phosphorous and nitrogen co-doped carbon quantum dots and fluorometric assay for detection of copper ions

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Abstract

Carbon quantum dots are becoming powerful fluorophore materials for metal ion analysis. Here, highly passivated green phosphorous and nitrogen co-doped carbon quantum dots (C-dots) were prepared using low-temperature carbonization route. Strong green fluorescence emission around 490 nm and excitation wavelength independent C-dots were obtained. Morphological, surface, and optical properties of the C-dots were characterized. Fluorescence emission of C-dots was quenched selectively by copper ions and restored by adding copper chelators, such as EDTA and sulfide ions. Thus, C-dots were successfully used for direct determination of copper ions. Detection limit as low as 1.5 nM (s/n = 3) was achieved for copper ions. Such a low detection limit is very significant for metal analysis using our proposed facile method and low-cost substrates. Experimental results showed that the prepared C-dots demonstrated high sensitivity and selectivity for Cu2+ ion detection and the method is robust and rugged.

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Acknowledgments

The author thanks Dr. Hugo Celio for his help with the XPS measurement at the University of Texas at Austin.

Funding

The author thanks the University of Sulaimani and Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research in Kurdistan for supporting the work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, College of Science, University of Sulaimani, Sulaimani, Kurdistan, Iraq

    Khalid M. Omer

  2. Komar University of Science and Technology, Qliasan St, Sulaimani, Kurdistan, Iraq

    Khalid M. Omer

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Correspondence to Khalid M. Omer.

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Omer, K.M. Highly passivated phosphorous and nitrogen co-doped carbon quantum dots and fluorometric assay for detection of copper ions. Anal Bioanal Chem 410, 6331–6336 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-018-1242-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-018-1242-0

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