One-Pot Synthesis of a Reversible and Sensitive Fluorescent Probe for the Detection of Malachite Green

Abstract

In this work, a recyclable and sensitive fluorescent nanoprobe, RhoB@ZIF-8 composite, has been designed and successfully synthesized by encapsulating rhodamine B (abbreviated as RhoB) into the cavities of zeolitic imidazolate framework-8 (ZIF-8) metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) through a facile one-pot method under mild conditions. The RhoB@ZIF-8 composite exhibited an emission band at 589 nm with fluorescent quantum yield of 19.8%. Since there was an efficient overlap between the absorption of malachite green (MG) and the fluorescence spectra (excitation and emission bands) of RhoB@ZIF-8 composite, the fluorescence intensity decreased sharply after MG was added. The fluorescence quenching was linear with the concentration of MG in the range of 0 to 13.0 μM with a low limit of detection (LOD) of 0.089 μM. Remarkably, this proposed sensing system has good performances including high specificity, good stability and recyclability. Finally, this fluorescent probe was successfully applied to the detection of MG in aquaculture water and fish tissue samples, revealing its potential practicability. This work will provide us a new research platform for MG sensing.