A near infrared fluorescence probe with dual-site for hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide detection

Abstract

Both hydrogen sulfide (H₂S) and sulfur dioxide (SO₂) are regarded as double-edged swords. They are toxic gases at high concentration, and at low concentration they are beneficial to the human. Therefore, it is of great significance to develop single chemosensor which enable to detect them with different fluorescence signal changes. In this work, a novel dual-site fluorescence probe (AMN-SSPy) with near infrared emission (675 nm) was designed, which realized quantitative detection for H₂S and SO₂ by fluorescence enhancement and fluorescence quenching, respectively. AMN-SSPy showed advantages such as excellent selectivity to H₂S and SO₂, strong anti-interference ability, high sensitivity for H₂S (LOD 1.03 µM for H₂S and 77.08 µM for SO₂) and low toxicity. In addition, AMN-SSPy possessed the capacity to successfully image the endogenous and exogenous H₂S, and it was also used to demonstrate that Ca²⁺ could induce accumulation of H₂S in cell and zebrafish. Finally, the rapid detection of SO₂ by AMN-SSPy in real samples was also established.

Keywords: Dual-site fluorescence probe; H(2)S; Imaging; Near infrared emission; SO(2).