Two novel fluorescent probes with different fluorescence signals based on phenothiazine for specific detection of ClO− and their applications

Hypochlorite plays an important role in life system, so it is necessary to develop an effective method to detect hypochlorite. In view of the advantages of fluorescent probes at present, we constructed two novel fluorescent probes (PTQ, PTN) based on phenothiazine, which can be used for specific detection of ClO−. Due to the introduction of nitrogen-containing heterocyclic quinazolinone, PTQ shows better optical properties: a great stokes shift (190 nm), excellent selectivity and anti-interference, low detection limit (0.054 μM) and fast response time (20 s). The color change of ClO− identified by the probe PTQ can be observed with naked eyes under sunlight. Through the calculation of density functional theory and mass spectrometry experiments, the mechanism of fluorescence detection of ClO− by PTQ was further verified. Furthermore, PTQ also realized the detection of ClO− in actual water samples and test strips, and achieved remarkable results. Due to its better optical properties and low cytotoxicity, probe PTQ has been successfully applied to the fluorescence detection of ClO− in living cells.