Boron, and nitrogen co-doped carbon dots as a multiplexing probe for sensing of p-nitrophenol, Fe (III), and temperature

Srikrishna Tummala; Chia-Hung Lee; Yen-Peng Ho

doi:10.1088/1361-6528/abeeb6

Boron, and nitrogen co-doped carbon dots as a multiplexing probe for sensing of p-nitrophenol, Fe (III), and temperature

Nanotechnology. 2021 Apr 6;32(26). doi: 10.1088/1361-6528/abeeb6.

Authors

Srikrishna Tummala¹, Chia-Hung Lee², Yen-Peng Ho¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry, National Dong Hwa University, Hualien 97401, Taiwan.
² Department of Life Science, National Dong Hwa University, Hualien 97401, Taiwan.

PMID: 33721842
DOI: 10.1088/1361-6528/abeeb6

Abstract

Boron and nitrogen co-doped carbon dots (B, N-CDs) were fabricated through a simple, one-step hydrothermal reaction of citric acid, boric acid, and tris base. The obtained B, N-CDs exhibit excitation-dependent fluorescence, high quantum yield (QY), biocompatibility, photostability, and aqueous solubility. The QY was substantially increased to 57% by doping boron atoms. Furthermore, the fluorescence intensity of B, N-CDs was temperature-dependent and decreased linearly from 283 to 333 K. The prepared B, N-CDs were used as a fluorescence probe for the detection ofpara-nitrophenol (p-NP) and Fe (III) ions with low detection limits of 0.17μM and 0.30μM, respectively. Moreover, the presence of p-NP could be further confirmed by a colorimetric assay. The fluorescent probe has been applied to determine p-NP and Fe (III) in a spiked serum sample and spiked water samples (lake and tap water). Moreover, the as-prepared B, N-CDs were of low toxicity and capable of bioimaging.

Keywords: B, N doped carbon dots; Fe (III) ions; cell imaging; heteroatoms; para-nitrophenol; temperature sensing.