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Detection of mercury(II) and glutathione using a carbon dots-based “off-on” fluorescent sensor and the construction of a logic gate

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Abstract

In this paper, we proposed an efficient method for mercury(II) and glutathione detection using a fluorescent nanoprobe as a sensor. Carbon dots were synthesized from polyethyleneimine and ammonium citrate via a one-step hydrothermal method. The fluorescence of carbon dots was quenched since electron transfer occurred due to the interaction between mercury(II) and functional groups on the surface of carbon dots. Adding glutathione to the carbon dots-mercury(II) system, the fluorescence was recovered due to the stronger binding ability of glutathione to mercury(II). Based on the above-mentioned principle, this “off-on” fluorescent sensor can easily achieve the detection of mercury(II) and glutathione, which provided limits of detection of 22.45 nM and 61.89 nM, respectively. In this paper, the proposed method has been applied to detect mercury(II) and glutathione in real lake water and serum, respectively, and a logic gate for sensing glutathione was presented. The developed “off-on” fluorescent sensor with high sensitivity and selectivity has shown great potential for mercury(II) and glutathione detection in environmental and biosensing fields.

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Funding

The work was funded by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2018YFC1604204-3) and the Key Research and Development Program of Jiangsu Province (No. BE2020756).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Science, Jiangnan University, Wuxi, 214122, China

    Xin Li, Guoqing Chen, Anqi Hu, Yi Xiong, Taiqun Yang, Chaoqun Ma, Lei Li, Hui Gao, Chun Zhu, Wei Zhang & Zicheng Cai

  2. Jiangsu Provincial Research Center of Light Industrial Optoelectronic Engineering and Technology, Wuxi, 214122, China

    Xin Li, Guoqing Chen, Anqi Hu, Yi Xiong, Taiqun Yang, Chaoqun Ma, Lei Li, Hui Gao, Chun Zhu, Wei Zhang & Zicheng Cai

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  1. Xin Li
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Li, X., Chen, G., Hu, A. et al. Detection of mercury(II) and glutathione using a carbon dots-based “off-on” fluorescent sensor and the construction of a logic gate. Anal Bioanal Chem 415, 1397–1409 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-023-04517-w

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