Efficient determination of doxorubicin in serum based on novel Sulfur-Enrichment and Nitrogen-Deficiency carbon nanodots

Abstract

Cancer is currently one of the deadliest diseases in the world. As one of the most common anti-cancer drugs, monitoring the amount of doxorubicin (Dox) with high sensitivity in serum can not only guide the dosage of Dox and minimize their toxicity, but also guarantee the effectiveness of treatment and the safety of patient’s life. Here, a green luminescent probe of the sulfur-enrichment, nitrogen-deficiency carbon nanodots (SCDs) was synthesized by melamine and 3-mercaptopropionic acid as nitrogen-sulfur-oxygen sources. The optical properties and surface functional groups of the SCDs have tremendously changed owing to the enrichment of the sulfur atoms. Interestingly, the SCDs luminescence can be suppressed by Dox through effective inner filter effect, which was permitted to construct high sensing platform for Dox determination. With the help of this mechanism, a wide linear range from 0.1 μM to 300 μM with a low limit of detection of 78.4 nM by utilizing SCDs-based constructed sensing platform were obtained. More importantly, this sensing platform has been successfully used to detect Dox in serum samples, and achieved satisfactory results with the recoveries between 97.7 and 104.2 %. This study conduces to the design of surface sulfur-containing carbon dots and broaden the utilization of functional SCDs in anthraquinone drugs detection.