L-Aspartic Acid Capped CdS Quantum Dots as a High Performance Fluorescence Assay for Sliver Ions (I) Detection

A new high performance fluorescence assay for detection of Ag⁺ based on CdS quantum dots (QDs) using L-Aspartic acid (L-Asp) as a stabilizer was proposed in this work. The CdS quantum dots conjugation with L-Aspartic acid (L-Asp@CdS QDs) were successfully synthesized via a simple hydrothermal process. The QDs have a fluorescence emission band maximum at 595 nm with a quantum yield of 11%. The obtained CdS QDs exhibit a particle size of 1.63 ± 0.28 nm and look like quantum dot flowers. Basically, the fluorescence intensity of L-Asp@CdS QDs can be enhanced only upon addition of Ag⁺ and a redshift in the fluorescence spectrum was observed. Under optimum conditions, the fluorescence enhancement of L-Asp@CdS QDs appeared to exhibit a good linear relationship in between 100-7000 nM (R² = 0.9945) with the Ag⁺ concentration, with a detection limit of 39 nM. The results indicated that the L-Asp@CdS QDs were well used in detection for Ag⁺ as fluorescence probe in aqueous solution with high sensitivity and selectivity. Moreover, the sensing system has been applied in detection Ag⁺ in real water samples. The recovery test results were 98.6%~113%, and relative standard deviation (n = 5) is less than 3.6%, which was satisfactory.