Facile One-Pot Synthesis of Folic Acid-Derived Carbon Dots for Selective “on-off-on” Fluorescence Detection of Ag+ and Glutathione with High Sensitivity
摘要
Herein, highly fluorescent blue-emitting carbon dots (B-CDs) were synthesized via a facile one-pot hydrothermal method using folic acid (FA) and tris(hydroxymethyl)aminomethane (Tris) as co-precursors. The synergistic effects of FA’s nitrogen-rich aromatic structure and Tris’s hydroxyl-rich dendritic architecture enabled controlled heteroatom doping, endowing the CDs with excellent optical properties. The B-CDs exhibited strong blue fluorescence (emission at 446 nm under 360 nm excitation), excellent water solubility, remarkable photostability, and a high quantum yield of 25.27%. Utilizing these B-CDs, we developed an “on-off-on” fluorescent nanoprobe for the dual detection of Ag+ and glutathione (GSH). The mechanism involves Ag+-induced fluorescence quenching via static quenching, followed by GSH-triggered recovery due to Ag+/GSH chelation. Under optimal conditions, there were great linear relationships between [I0/I-1] and the concentration of Ag+, [I2/I1-1]and the concentration of GSH, with low detection limits of 17.45 nM and 80.95 nM, respectively. Furthermore, based on the “on-off-on” fluorescent sensing platform, Ag+ was effectively detected in mineral water & river water, and GSH was detected in tomato & green pepper.