Liu Y, Yang L, Li L, Liang X, Li S, Fu Y. A dual thiourea-appended perylenebisimide "turn-on" fluorescent chemosensor with high selectivity and sensitivity for Hg
2+ in living cells.
Spectrochim Acta A Mol Biomol Spectrosc 2020;
241:118678. [PMID:
32650248 DOI:
10.1016/j.saa.2020.118678]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/16/2020] [Revised: 06/30/2020] [Accepted: 06/30/2020] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
Sensing heavy metal ions particularly for the most toxic Hg2+ is a long-term pursuit for chemists because of its obvious and extreme harmfulness to both the environment and human health. Herein, a novel 'turn-on' perylenebisimide-thiourea fluorescent probe PBI-BTB is achieved for rapid detection of Hg2+ in a DMSO/H2O (5/1, v/v) solution through a typical Hg2+-promoting desulfurization reaction, which has been investigated through Job's plot titration, FT-IR, 1H NMR and HRMS analysis. A remarkable fluorescence emission enhancement at 540 and 580 nm is observed in the presence of Hg2+, which is visible to the naked eye with high selectivity and sensitivity. Moreover, probe PBI-BTB combined strong anti-interference recognition with short response time (< 1 min). The rapid fluorescence response with low limit of detection (0.35 μM) in a wide pH range of 3.0-11.0 makes PBI-BTB a promising candidate for detection of Hg2+ without any buffer system. Furthermore, the practicability of probe PBI-BTB upon the Hg2+ recognition in human liver cancer cells (HepG-2) has been studied through fluorescent live cell imaging which reveals the probe's low toxicity to organism as well as the favorable cell permeability of PBI-BTB for detecting Hg2+ in biological systems.
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