Sustainable synthesis of carbon dots from agarose waste and prospective application in sensing of L-aspartic acid

Abstract The excessive utilization of carbon dots (CDs) has led to different fates and perseverance which further prejudiced by various photochemical and other transformations. The mechanistic behaviour of their respective conversions is still very unclear. The present report fulfils this knowledge breach by single step synthesis of CDs with one step synthesis of CDs by thermal treatment by using agarose waste. The formed particles have possessed outstanding quantum yield with value ∼ 62%. The developed CDs are highly sustainable and non-toxic in nature as compared to organic and inorganic quantum dots as their unknown chemical, physical and optoelectronic properties limit their widespread use. The exceptional luminescence and physicochemical characteristics of developed CDs inspired this research work towards commercial products. With this view, they particles have been successfully applied in recognition of biological component such as aspartic acid. The fluorescence emission intensity of developed CDs reflects extraordinary sensitivity and selectivity towards L-aspartic acid out of twenty amino acids through quenching mechanism in wide concentration range with a linear relationship of 10 µm to 1 nm and value of detection limit was found to be 0.28 nm. Astonishingly, such a sensor can be applied in real world analysis with satisfactory spiked recovery of 98 %. The developed C-dots are pragmatic to real sample recognition and results are highly sustaining.