Study on 2-Acetylpyrazine (pyridine-2ʹ-acetyl) hydrazone as a fluorescent sensor for Al3+

In this article, a simple hydrazone-based ''turn on'' fluorescent chemosensor has been designed, synthesized and evaluated. Upon addition of Al3+ ions, the sensor showed high selectivity and sensitivity with a 900-fold enhancement at 490 nm, which was attributed to the photoinduced electron-transfer (PET) and the chelation-enhanced fluorescence (CHEF). In addition, the detection limit of this sensor for Al3+ could reach 10−7 mol/L.