Blue Luminescent Glutathione‐protected Copper Nanoclusters for Selective Detection of Barbaloin

Abstract Based on the importance of barbaloin (Bar), development of efficient sensing methods in barbaloin detection has remarkable function and practical significance. In this work, copper nanoclusters (Cu NCs) with good water‐soluble character were prepared by one‐pot way and successfully used for selective detection of barbaloin. The stable probe with uniform size was protected by glutathione (GSH) and reduced by ascorbic acid (AA). Intriguingly, fluorescence of GSH−Cu NCs was quenched by barbaloin. The static quenching and inner filter effect (IFE) was supposed to main quenching mechanism. Furthermore, GSH−Cu NCs could well distinguish barbaloin from possible interferes and exhibited linear relationship of barbaloin concentrations from 3 to 100 μM. Significantly, satisfactory recovery experiments were successfully operated in bovine serum samples for barbaloin sensing. This probe with superior fluorescence properties provided better choice for barbaloin detection.