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Sequential colorimetric sensing of cupric and mercuric ions by regulating the etching process of triangular gold nanoplates

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Abstract

A triangular gold nanoplate (AuNPL)–based colorimetric assay is presented for ultrasensitive determination of cupric ions (Cu2+) and mercuric ions (Hg2+) in sequence. AuNPLs were found to be etched efficiently when producing triiodide ions (I3−) by a redox reaction between Cu2+ and iodide ions (I−), leading to a change of the shape of AuNPLs from triangular to sphere along with a color change from blue to pink. In the presence of Hg2+ the etching of AuNPLs was suppressed due to the consumption of I− by the formation of HgI2. With an increase of the concentration of the Hg2+ a transformation from sphere to triangular in the shape of AuNPLs occurred with a color change from pink to blue. The evolution of AuNPLs from etching to anti-etching state by sequential addition of Cu2+ and Hg2+ was accompanied with color variations and band shifts of localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR), allowing for visual and spectroscopic determination of Cu2+ and Hg2+ successively within 15 min. In the range 0.01–1.5 μM for Cu2+ and 0.02–3.0 μM for Hg2+, the linear relationship between the band shift values and the target ions concentration was found good (R2 > 0.996). The limit of detections (3S/k) was 19 nM for Cu2+ and 9 nM for Hg2+, respectively. The lowest visual estimation concentration was 80 nM for both Cu2+ and Hg2+ through the distinguishable color changes. This system exhibited desirable selectivity for Cu2+ and Hg2+ over other common ions tested. The method has been successfully applied to sequential determination of Cu2+ and Hg2+ in real water and food samples.

Scheme 1 Schematic illustration for sequential detection of Cu2+ and Hg2+ based on etching of AuNPLs

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Funding

This work was financially supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 21974085, 61971274) and the Key Laboratory of Analytical Chemistry for Biology and Medicine of Ministry of Education in Wuhan University (ACBM2014002).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, College of Sciences, Shanghai University, 99 Shangda Road, Shanghai, 200444, People’s Republic of China

    Qian Wang, Ruifeng Peng, Yishan Wang, Shouzhe Zhu, Xiaoxia Yan, Yunyi Lei, Haibo He & Liqiang Luo

  2. Shimadzu (China) Co., Ltd., Shanghai, 200052, People’s Republic of China

    Youbao Sun

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  1. Qian Wang
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  2. Ruifeng Peng
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Correspondence to Haibo He or Liqiang Luo.

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Wang, Q., Peng, R., Wang, Y. et al. Sequential colorimetric sensing of cupric and mercuric ions by regulating the etching process of triangular gold nanoplates. Microchim Acta 187, 205 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-020-4176-0

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