Rapidly responsive and highly selective fluorescent probe for sulfite detection in real samples and living cells

Abstract

Sulfites (HSO3− or SO3−) have very significant toxicity in the environment and in the system. However, developing specific identification of sulfite probes is still very important. In this paper, a highly selective colorimetric and fluorescent probe (HHC) was synthesized to detect HSO3− in real samples and living cells. Sensing performance and preponderance are listed as follows. First, probe HHC showed remarkable selectivity for HSO3− over varieties of other species, including cysteine, glutathione, S2−, CN−, and reactive oxygen species, mainly because of the introduction of the electron-poor CC double bond for HSO3−. Second, probe HHC has great molar absorptivity, allowing it to act as a visual detection of probe for HSO3−. Third, the fluorescence intensities of HHC linearly correlate with the concentration of HSO3−, with a detection limit of 6.8 nm. Finally, our proposed probe can be applied to the visually determination of trace HSO3− in real samples and living HeLa cells with high precision. We hope that our proposed probe will greatly benefit biological sciences when biological researchers survey the role of HSO3− in biological systems.