Synthesis of Fluorescent Carbon Quantum Dots based on Boletus speciosus and Analysis of Metronidazole

Abstract

Background: Metronidazole is widely used due to their clinical excellence in treating systemic or local infections caused by anaerobic bacteria. However, it is easily soluble in water, not easy to biodegrade and adsorb, stay for a long time in environments, causing great harm to human health and food safety. Therefore, it is important to choose highly selective and sensitive methods for metronidazole content determination in environments. In this paper, the edible fungus Boletus speciosus was used as the carbon precursor to successfully prepared carbon dots by one-step hydrothermal method, and were used for the analysis of metronidazole. Methods: Characterization of the prepared carbon dots from B. speciosus (Bs-CDs) were studied by Transmission electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and X-Ray Diffraction. Results: The linear equation was y=0.06231+0.01099x (R2=0.9970) with metronidazole concentration of 2.5~50 μM, and the detection limit was 71 nM. The fluorescence quenching mechanism of Bs-CDs detected metronidazole belonged to internal filtration effect. Bs-CDs were applied to detect metronidazole in actual water samples, presenting good sensitivity and high recovery rate (97.0~106.0%). Conclusion: This method provides a new idea for the application of carbon dots in metronidazole content detection.