Microwave-assisted rapid green synthesis of photoluminescent carbon nanodots from flour and their applications for sensitive and selective detection of mercury(II) ions

The article reports on the microwave-assisted rapid green synthesis of photoluminescent carbon nanodots (C-dots) with diameters in the range of 1–4 nm using flour as the carbon source. It suggests that the resultant C-dots exhibit high sensitivity and selectivity toward Hg2+ with a detection limit as low as 0.5 nM and a linear range of 0.0005–0.01 μM. The practical use of this system for Hg2+ determination in real lake water samples is also demonstrated successfully.