A rhodamine-based fluorescent probe for colorimetric and fluorescence lighting-up determination of toxic thiophenols in environmental water and living cells

Abstract Thiophenols are a class of highly toxic environmental pollutant, hence it is very necessary to monitor thiophenols in environment and living cells with an efficient and reliable method. Herein, a novel fluorescent probe for thiophenols has been developed, which exhibited a colorimetric and fluorescence turn-on dual response towards thiophenols with good selectivity and fast response. The sensing mechanism for thiophenols was attributed to nucleophilic substitution reaction, which was confirmed by HPLC. The probe exhibited good recovery (from 90% to 107%) and low limit of detection for thiophenols (37 nM) in industrial wastewater. Moreover, the probe has been successfully employed to visualize thiophenol in living cells. Therefore, the fluorescent probe has good capability for monitoring thiophenols in environmental samples and biological systems.