Multifunctional carbon dots originated from waste garlic peel for rapid sensing of heavy metals and fluorescent imaging of 2D and 3D spheroids cultured fibroblast cells

Prakash Krishnaiah; Raji Atchudan; Suguna Perumal; Prakash Gangadaran; Devaraj Manoj; Byeong-Cheol Ahn; Raju Suresh Kumar; Abdulrahman I Almansour; Yong Rok Lee; Byong-Hun Jeon

doi:10.1016/j.saa.2023.123422

Multifunctional carbon dots originated from waste garlic peel for rapid sensing of heavy metals and fluorescent imaging of 2D and 3D spheroids cultured fibroblast cells

Spectrochim Acta A Mol Biomol Spectrosc. 2024 Jan 5:304:123422. doi: 10.1016/j.saa.2023.123422. Epub 2023 Sep 16.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Earth Resources and Environmental Engineering, Hanyang University, 222, Wangsimni-ro, Seongdong-gu, Seoul 04763, South Korea.
² School of Chemical Engineering, Yeungnam University, Gyeongsan 38541, Republic of Korea; Department of Chemistry, Saveetha School of Engineering, Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences, Chennai 602105, Tamil Nadu, India. Electronic address: [email protected].
³ Department of Chemistry, Sejong University, Seoul 143‑747, Republic of Korea.
⁴ BK21 FOUR KNU Convergence Educational Program of Biomedical Sciences for Creative Future Talents, Department of Biomedical Science, School of Medicine, Kyungpook National University, Daegu 41944, Republic of Korea; Department of Nuclear Medicine, School of Medicine, Kyungpook National University, Kyungpook National University Hospital, Daegu 41944, Republic of Korea.
⁵ Department of Chemistry, Karpagam Academy of Higher Education, Coimbatore 641021, Tamil Nadu, India; Centre for Material Chemistry, Karpagam Academy of Higher Education, Coimbatore 641021, Tamil Nadu, India.
⁶ Department of Chemistry, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia.
⁷ School of Chemical Engineering, Yeungnam University, Gyeongsan 38541, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: [email protected].
⁸ Department of Earth Resources and Environmental Engineering, Hanyang University, 222, Wangsimni-ro, Seongdong-gu, Seoul 04763, South Korea. Electronic address: [email protected].

PMID: 37734247
DOI: 10.1016/j.saa.2023.123422

Abstract

Here, we prepared sulfur and nitrogen self-doped carbon dots derived from garlic peel extract (GPSNCDs) using a hydrothermal method. The as-synthesized GPSNCDs were confirmed using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and transmission electron microscopy. The analytical techniques indicate that the resulting GPSNCDs exhibit distinct emissive carbon-core with functionalities (owing to various ligands in the GPSNCDs). These functionalities are responsible for excellent hydrophilic and optical properties, including excitation-dependent emission and anti-photobleaching. Fluorescence intensities of GPSNCDs were quenched in the existence of Mn²⁺ and Fe³⁺ ions. This indicates that the GPSNCDs were sensitive to Fe³⁺ and Mn²⁺ ions with a limited range from 5 to 50 µM and showed lower recognition at ∼0.75 and 0.95 µM, respectively. In addition, the sensing results were generated in a short time (20 s). The cytotoxicity of GPSNCDs was tested to demonstrate that they are sufficiently safe to use for cellular imaging. The novel fluorescent GPSNCDs-based sensor can be used as a high-performance sensor for environmental monitoring. Further, GPSNCDs showed greater biocompatibility with normal fibroblast cells, and In Vitro fluorescent imaging of GPSNCDs revealed strong fluorescence signals in the two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) spheroids cultured fibroblast cells. The properties mentioned above demonstrate that the GPSNCDs can be applied to imaging normal cells without further modifications.

Keywords: Carbon dots; Cellular imaging; Detection of metal ions; Fluorescence sensor; Garlic peel.