Surface molecular imprinting on silane-functionalized carbon dots for selective recognition of nifedipine

Abstract

This study describes the development of a novel eco-friendly molecularly imprinted fluorescent sensor for nifedipine (NIF) based on silane-functionalized carbon dots (MIP@SiC-dots). The sensor was synthesized by a sol–gel reaction (imprinting process) and characterized by fluorescence spectroscopy, UV-vis spectroscopy, TEM, SEM and FT-IR. The fluorescence from the MIP@SiC-dots was quenched more strongly by NIF as compared to the non-imprinted polymer. This indicates that the MIP-coated SiC-dots, which act as a fluorescence sensing material, can recognize NIF. Under optimized operational conditions, a linear response was obtained in the concentration range from 0.28 to 3.4 μM with a detection limit of 0.076 μM. The proposed sensor was applied for NIF determination in serum and urine samples with the recoveries from 94.2% to 105.6%, showing promising potential applications in biomedical analysis.