Highly luminescence manganese doped carbon dots

Heteroatom doped carbon dots (CDs) with distinct merits are of great attractions in various fields such as solar cells, catalysis, trace element detection and photothermal therapy. In this work, we successfully synthesized blue-fluorescence and photostability manganese-doped carbon dots (Mn-CDs) with a quantum yield up to 7.5%, which was prepared by a facile one-step hydrothermal method with sodium citrate and manganese chloride. The Mn-CDs is the high mono-dispersity, uniform spherical nanoparticles. The Mn element plays a critical role in achieving a high quantum yield in synthesis of carbon dots, which was confirmed by the structure analysis using XPS and FTIR. Spectroscopic investigations proved that the decent PLQY and luminescence properties of Mn-CDs are due to the heteroatom doped, oxidized carbon-based surface passivation. In addition, the Mn-CDs are demonstrated as promising fluorescent sensors for iron ions with a linear range of 0–500 μmol/L and a detection limit of 2.1 nmol/L (turn-off), indicating their great potential as a fluorescent probe for chemical sensing.