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Updated: Jun 14, 2026
An Anaerobic Biosensor Assay for the Detection of Mercury and Cadmium
Published on: December 17, 2018
Highly sensitive gold nanoparticle-based colorimetric sensing of mercury(II) through simple ligand exchange reaction
Yang-Rae Kim1, Rakesh Kumar Mahajan, Jong Seung Kim
1Department of Chemistry, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-747, Korea.
Abstract:
A strategy for the rational design of a novel colorimetric sensor based on dithioerythritol-modified gold nanoparticles for the selective recognition of Hg2+ in aqueous media is presented. This approach relies on the combination of gold nanoparticles with Hg2+ through sulfur-Hg2+-sulfur interaction. The gold nanoparticles showed high selectivity toward Hg2+ with binding-induced red shift in the absorption spectra, with no response to major interfering cations such as Pb2+, Cd2+, and Cu2+ in the presence of ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid. The system responds to Hg2+ with a detection limit of 100 nM and might open a new avenue for the development of Hg2+ sensing probes.
