In vivo bio-imaging studies of highly selective, sensitive rhodamine based fluorescent chemosensor for the detection of Cu2+/Fe3+ ions

Abstract A Rhodamine based quinoline conjugated fluorescence chemosensor (RhQA) was delineated for the detection of two paramagnetic metal ions (Fe 3+ /Cu 2+ ) through various analytical techniques. The addition of Fe 3+ and Cu 2+ ions induced a great enhancement in the absorption of RhQA; moreover, Fe 3+ also induced a strong fluorescence enhancement. Hence, this is an admirable example for the selective detection of the biologically/environmentally significant transition metal ions as dual chemosensor. The obtained results reveal that the chemosensor (RhQA) has remarkable selectivity towards Fe 3+ /Cu 2+ ions even in the presence of higher concentration of various interference metal ions such as Pb 2+ , Cd 2+ , Hg 2+ , Zn 2+ , Ni 2+ , Co 2+ , Mn 2+ , Fe 2+ , Cr 3+ , Ca 2+ , Ba 2+ , Mg 2+ , Na + , K + , and Ag + . Its excellency in sensitivity was confirmed by the obtained linear relationship with Fe 2+ /Cu 3+ ions, and the calculated detection limit values are, 1.8 × 10 −8 and 3.3 × 10 −8 M for Cu 2+ and Fe 3+ ions respectively. More interestingly, this chemosensor, RhQA was successfully employed to trace out the intra cellular Fe 3+ ions in Zebrafish embryos.