Royal Society of Chemistry, RSC Advances, 34(5), p. 26856-26862, 2015
DOI: 10.1039/c5ra02376a
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Recently, graphene nanosheets (GNS) have been widely investigated and used in capacitors, catalysts, biological/chemical sensors, etc. However, the feasible applications of GNS prepared with different reducing agents as a carrier of luminescent sensor have never been systematically studied yet. Herein, a serial of GNS were acquired using different reducing agents, such as hydrazine, glucose and urea. The reduction degrees and properties of the GNS samples were systematically studied by using X-ray diffractometer, Raman spectra, IR spectra and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The results indicated that the reduction degree was in the order of hydrazine>glucose>urea, demonstrating that reducing agents plays an important role in the bulk fabrication of high quality graphene. Then the GNS samples were all employed as a carrier of Ru(phen)3Cl2 (tris(1,10-phenanthroline)ruthenium(II) dichloride) sensor to discriminate DNA. It is found that all the GNS samples can effectively quench the emission of the Ru(phen)3Cl2 sensor. After addition of a certain amount of DNA into the corresponding systems, the luminescence intensity was all fully recovered. By comparison, the luminescence response of GNS-G prepared with glucose shows the best linear correlation to the DNA added, with a detection limit of 3.62×10-9 g/mL, indicating GNS-G can be employed as a good carrier of Ru(phen)3Cl2 to discriminate DNA. This work will significantly advance the research of bulk fabrication of high quality graphene and the specific applications in luminescent sensor of the graphene-based functional materials in the future.