Abstract
A new colorimetric detection of methylmercury (CH3Hg+) was developed, which was based on the surface deposition of Hg enhancing the catalytic activity of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs). The AuNPs were functionalized with a specific DNA strand (HT7) recognizing CH3Hg+, which was used to capture and separate CH3Hg+ by centrifugation. It was found that the CH3Hg+ reduction resulted in the deposition of Hg onto the surface of AuNPs. As a result, the catalytic activity of the AuNPs toward the chromogenic reaction of 3,3,5,5-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB)-H2O2 was remarkably enhanced. Under optimal conditions, a limit of detection of 5.0 nM was obtained for CH3Hg+ with a linear range of 10–200 nM. We demonstrated that the colorimetric method was fairly simple with a low cost and can be conveniently applied to CH3Hg+ detection in environmental samples.
Highlights
Mercuric ions widely exist in the environment and have distinct toxic effects on human beings.Organic forms of mercury (Hg) demonstrate much higher toxicity than inorganic Hg due to their higher lipophilicity and easier bioaccumulation through the food chain, such as in the tissue of fish [1,2]
After the AuNPs were modified with HT7, which is a CH3 Hg+ recognition
The HT7 -AuNPs complex was stable in 0.15 M NaCl, which indicated the successful preparation of the HT7 -AuNPs
Summary
Mercuric ions widely exist in the environment and have distinct toxic effects on human beings.Organic forms of mercury (Hg) demonstrate much higher toxicity than inorganic Hg due to their higher lipophilicity and easier bioaccumulation through the food chain, such as in the tissue of fish [1,2]. Complex hyphenated techniques, such as high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) or gas chromatography (GC), coupled to specific detectors, such as mass spectrometry (MS), inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) or atomic fluorescence spectrometry (AFS), are required for methylmercury detection [4,5,6]. These techniques generally require expensive instruments and are time-consuming and costly.
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