A cyanobiphenyl-based fluorescent ''lighting-up'' sensor for highly selective and sensitive recognition of Al³⁺:...

The recognition of toxic Al³⁺ in foods and biosystems has of great interest to researchers. Herein, a novel cyanobiphenyl-based chemosensor CATH (E)-N'-((4'-cyano-4-hydroxy-[1,1'-biphenyl]-3-yl)methylene)thiophene-2-carbohydrazide was fabricated and shown to recognize Al³⁺ in HEPES buffer:EtOH (90:10, v:v, pH = 7.4) by ''lighting-up'' fluorescence sensing. The CATH evidenced high sensitivity (LOD = 13.1 nM) and excellent selectivity to Al³⁺ over competing cations. The Job's plot, TOF-MS and theoretical computation studies were performed to probe the binding mechanism of Al³⁺ to CATH. Additionally; CATH was successfully utilized to practical applications and employed to recover of Al³⁺ from different food samples. More importantly, it was employed to intracellular Al³⁺ detection in living cells including THLE2 and HepG2.