Recent progress of carbon dot fluorescent probes for tetracycline detection

Abstract

Recently, tetracyclines (TCs) have become the most used antibiotics in animal husbandry since they can kill most Gram-positive and -negative bacteria. However, it is still a tough problem to accurately detect residual TCs. Carbon dots (CDs) have attracted intensive attention owing to their excellent fluorescence performance, good biocompatibility and facile availability. Thus, many research studies have been conducted to fabricate high-performance CD fluorescent probes for the fast and accurate detection of TCs. Nevertheless, a comprehensive summary about the effective synthesis of CDs and their practical function in detecting TCs is still needed to further strengthen the wide application of CDs. We herein first give a detailed introduction of TCs and CDs. Then, based on the different synthetic technologies, the synthetic methods of CDs are divided into top-down and bottom-up strategies. In addition, from the different doped species, we classify CD fluorescent probes as undoped CDs, metal-doped CDs, nonmetal-doped CDs, co-doped CDs and CD nanocomposites. Furthermore, the remaining defects and prospects are highlighted to provide valuable guidance in preparing commendable CDs and detecting TCs.