Continuous hydrothermal flow synthesis of blue-luminescent, 
excitation-independent N-doped carbon quantum dots as nanosensors

Baragau, Ioan-Alexandru; Power, Nicholas P; Morgan, David John; Heil, Tobias; Lobo, Richard Alvares; Roberts, Christopher S; Titirici, Magdalena; Dunn, Steve; Kellici, Suela

doi:10.1039/C9TA11781D

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Continuous hydrothermal flow synthesis of blue-luminescent, excitation-independent N-doped carbon quantum dots as nanosensors

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Heil, Tobias
Nadezda V. Tarakina, Kolloidchemie, Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces, Max Planck Society;

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Citation

Baragau, I.-A., Power, N. P., Morgan, D. J., Heil, T., Lobo, R. A., Roberts, C. S., et al. (2020). Continuous hydrothermal flow synthesis of blue-luminescent, excitation-independent N-doped carbon quantum dots as nanosensors. Journal of Materials Chemistry A, 8(6), 3270-3279. doi:10.1039/C9TA11781D.

Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/21.11116/0000-0005-847C-B

Abstract

Blue-luminescent N-doped carbon quantum dots (NCQDs) exhibiting rarely observed excitation independent optical properties are synthesised from citric acid in the presence of ammonia via a Continuous Hydrothermal Flow Synthesis (CHFS) approach. CHFS is an eco-friendly, rapid synthetic approach (within fractions of a second) facilitating ease of scale-up industrialization as well as offering materials with superior properties. The synthesised CQDs readily disperse in aqueous solution, have an average particle size of 3.3 ± 0.7 nm, with highest emission intensity at 441 nm (and a narrow full width at half maximum, FWHM ~78 nm) under a 360 nm excitation wavelength. Carbon quantum dots, without any further modification, exhibited a high selectivity and sensitivity as a nano-sensor for the highly toxic and carcinogenic chromium(VI) ions. The nano-chemo-sensor delivers significant advantages including simplicity of manufacturing via a continuous, cleaner technology (using targeted biomass precursor), high selectivity, sensitivity and fast response leading to potential applications in environmental industry as well photovoltaics, bio-tagging, bio-sensing and beyond.