Facile synthesis of sulfur-doped carbon quantum dots from vitamin B1 for highly selective detection of Fe3+ ion

Carbon quantum dots (CQDs) are remarkable nanomaterials due to their promising excellent properties. Herein, a facile, economical and straight forward hydrothermal strategy has been developed to prepare fluorescent sulfur-doped carbon quantum dots from Vitamin B1. The as-prepared B1-CQDs have an average size of 3.2 nm and exhibit excitation-dependent PL behavior with a fluorescence quantum yield of 4.4%. Furthermore, the B1-CQDs could be applied as an efficient fluorescent probe for sensitively and selectively detection of Fe3+ with the detection limit as low as 177 nM.