Forster resonance energy transfer between MoS2 quantum dots and polyaniline for turn-on bovine serum albumin sensing

Forster resonance energy transfer (FRET) between MoS2 and polyaniline (PANI) is explored by steady state and time resolved fluorescence spectroscopy in the present study and FRET based turn-on sensing of bovine serum albumin (BSA) is also demonstrated. The intense fluorescence of prepared MoS2 QDs is quenched by addition of PANI. Stern-Volmer plot suggests that the quenching is dynamic one. The observed quenching is explained by FRET mechanism also. The efficiency of energy transfer and rate of energy transfer are found to be increasing with increasing concentration of PANI. Time resolved fluorescence measurements show the reduction of lifetime components of MoS2 (donor) upon increasing concentration of PANI (acceptor). The quenched fluorescence of MoS2 in the presence of PANI is gradually recovered by addition of BSA at nM level which demonstrates turn-on BSA sensing. (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.