Carbon dots derived from fungus for sensing hyaluronic acid and hyaluronidase

•Carbon dots (CDs) derived from fungus were first synthesized.•Photoinduced electron transfer was established to explore the quenching mechanism.•This strategy has broadened avenues for assaying hyaluronic acid and hyaluronidase.

Herein, one type of facile-green carbon dots (CDs) derived from the mushroom (fungus) has been successfully prepared with a quantum yield (QY) of nearly 15.3%. Interestingly, not only the precursor of this CDs and the whole synthesis procedure were environmental-friendly, but the CDs also exhibited multiple advantages including excellent photostability, non-toxicity and satisfactory stability. Significantly, sensitively assaying hyaluronic acid (HA) and hyaluronidase (HAase) in a maneuverable way have been further proposed on the basis of HA adsorbed on the surface of CDs by static electric and further digested by HAase. To be specific, the CDs exhibited obviously electrostatic adsorption towards HA, resulting in an effective fluorescence quenching through the aggregations appearing. Again, the enzymatic digestion between HA and HAase occurred, thus an immediately fluorescent recovery appeared once HAase was introduced. Thereby, quantitative evaluation of HAase concentration in a linear range from 0.2 U mL−1 to 10000 U mL−1 was achieved along with the range from 50 pM to 50 μM for HA, and its practicability was subsequently validated by detecting human urine samples, suggesting that the current strategy could broaden the sensing approaches for assaying HA and HAase.

Graphical abstractOne type of facile-green carbon dots (CDs) originated from the mushroom (fungus) has been successfully prepared. Significantly, sensitively assaying hyaluronic acid (HA) and hyaluronidase (HAase) in a maneuverable way have been further proposed on the basis of HA adsorbed on the surface of CDs by static electric and further digested by HAase.Download high-res image (83KB)Download full-size image