Synthesis of dopamine-mediated Cu nanoclusters for sensing and fluorescent coding

Abstract

Herein, the synthesis of Cu nanoclusters (CuNCs) templated with dopamine has been first successfully established by reducing CuSO₄ in an aqueous medium, and this type of nanocluster emitted cyan high-fluorescence. Subsequently, the CuNCs were employed for assaying tetracycline (TC) on the basis of the quenching of the fluorescence intensity of CuNCs once TC was introduced. The proposed analytical strategy permitted the detection of TC in a linear range of 3.6 × 10⁻⁶ to 1.0 × 10⁻³ mol L⁻¹ together with a detection limit of 9.2 × 10 ⁻⁷ mol L⁻¹ at a signal-to-noise ratio of 3. Meaningfully, the CuNCs described here were further applied for fluorescent painting and coding.