Two high selective and sensitive ratiometric fluorescence probes for detecting hypochlorite

In this work, 2-naphthol (1) and its derivative 1-(2-hydroxynaphthalen-1-yl)naphthalen-2-ol (BINOL) (2) as two ratiometric fluorescence probes are used to detect hypochlorite, which is one of the biologically important reactive oxygen species (ROS), by UV–vis and fluorescent spectrometers. The fluorescence intensity of probe 1 and 2 were gradually decreased when addition of ClO−. Also, the detailed signal mechanism was elucidated by 1H NMR and ESI-MS. In addition, the detection limits of probe 1 and 2 for ClO− were found to be 81 nM and 49 nM. Both two probes showed high selectivity for hypochlorite.