Synthesis of catalytically active multielement-doped carbon dots and application for colorimetric detection of glucose

A novel multielement-doped carbon dots (ME-CDs) were synthesized by simply hydrothermal treatment of animal blood. Results revealed that the prepared carbon dots were mainly constituted of carbon, oxygen and nitrogen elements with trace amount of iron and sulfur elements, illustrating strong fluorescence with a quantum yield of 32.6%. The as-prepared carbon dots displayed excellent peroxidase-like catalytic activities attributed to the doped iron elements in the ME-CDs. The nanodots could be utilized to fabricate a colorimetric sensor for glucose detection and demonstrated good sensitivity and specificity. This work provides a facile strategy for the synthesis of catalytically active carbon dots and building of colorimetric sensor.