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Fluorometric determination of mercury(II) via a graphene oxide-based assay using exonuclease III-assisted signal amplification and thymidine–Hg(II)–thymidine interaction

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Abstract

A highly sensitive and selective fluorometric method is described for determination of mercury(II). It is based on (a) the use of graphene oxide (GO) acting as a quencher of the fluoresence of the carboxy-fluorescein (FAM), and (b) of Hg(II)-triggered cleavage of the newly formed nucleic acid sequences harbored blunt 3′-hydroxyl termini by exonuclease III (Exo III) that leads to signal amplification. Two DNA probes are used, viz. a capture probe (CP) and a help probe; HP) that is partially complementary. In the absence of Hg(II), the FAM-labeled hairpin (signal probe, SP) is adsorbed onto the surface of GO via π-stacking interactions. CP blocks the release of the HP for binding to SP. This results in quenching of the green fluorescence of the label. Upon addition of Hg(II), the linear structure of CP is converted to a hairpin structure due to the formation of thymidine–Hg(II)–thymidine duplexes. HP is released from the CP/HP hybrids, and this causes SP to be released from from GO and fluorescence to be recovered. The signal is strongly amplified by using Exo III-assisted targeting and recycling of HP. Hence, Hg(II) can be detected via the strong increase in fluorescence. The method has a linear response in the 0.1 to 30 nM Hg(II) concentration range and a 10 pM detection limit. It was applied to the determination of Hg(II) in three (spiked) Chinese medicines.

Schematic representation of fluorescence sensing strategy for Hg2+ by using graphene oxide as a quencher and exonuclease III-assisted signal amplification.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank National Natural Science Foundation (81774126, 81803964), Key Project Funded by Hunan traditional Chinese medicine administration (201711), Open Project Funded by Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory (20160214), Open Project Funded by Innovation Platform of Education department of Hunan Province (17 K067), Doctor start-up Foundation of Hunan University of Chinese Medicine (9982-1001019), Science and Technology Innovation Team in Colleges and Universities in Hunan Province《Chinese traditional medicine for treatment of infectious diseases》(No: 15) and Key Subjects of Hunan University of Chinese Medicine《Basic medicine》(NO.1) for the financial support. We also thank Gabrielle David, PhD, from Liwen Bianji, Edanz Group China (www.liwenbianji.cn/ac), for editing the English text of a draft of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Microbiology, The Medicine School of Hunan University of Chinese Medicine, Changsha, Hunan, 410208, People’s Republic of China

    Yi Ning, Jue Hu, Ke Wei, Guliang He, Tao Wu & Fangguo Lu

  2. Key Discipline of Pathogenic Biology, The University Innovation Team of Hunan Province, Changsha, Hunan, 410208, People’s Republic of China

    Fangguo Lu

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  1. Yi Ning
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Ning, Y., Hu, J., Wei, K. et al. Fluorometric determination of mercury(II) via a graphene oxide-based assay using exonuclease III-assisted signal amplification and thymidine–Hg(II)–thymidine interaction. Microchim Acta 186, 216 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-019-3332-x

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