Optical methods for the detection of heavy metal ions

The review covers an important area of the modern chemistry, namely, the detection of heavy metal ions using optical molecular detectors. The role of this method in metal ion detection and the physicochemical grounds of operation of chemosensors are discussed, and examples of detection of most abundant heavy metal ions and synthetic approaches to molecular detectors are presented. The immobilization of molecular detectors on solid substrates for the design of analytical sensor devices is described.