Direct Comparison of Triggering Motifs on Chemiluminescent Probes for Hydrogen Sulfide Detection in Water

Hydrogen sulfide (H₂S) is an important biomolecule and significant efforts have focused on developing chemical tools to aid different biological investigations. Of such tools, there are relatively few chemiluminescent or bioluminescent methods for H₂S detection. Here we report two dioxetane-based chemiluminescent probes for H₂S detection. With these probes, we directly compare the probe response to H₂S-mediated azide reduction and nucleophilic displacement of 2,4-dinitrophenyl motifs and demonstrate that the S_NAr cleavage of the DNP group results in a larger response and greater stability in water.