Development of a simple pyrazine-derived turn on'' Al3+ fluorescent sensor with high selectivity and sensitivity

In this article, a novel pyrazine-derived hydrazone Schiff-base ligand bearing the quinoline unit (1) has been designed, synthesized and evaluated as a turn on'' fluorescent chemosensor for Al3+ based on the photoinduced electron-transfer (PET) mechanism and the chelation-enhanced fluorescence (CHEF) phenomenon. The sensor 1 showed remarkably enhanced fluorescence intensity at 488 nm in the presence of Al3+ ion and it also showed high selectivity and sensitivity towards Al3+ ion over a wide range of metal ions in ethanol, for the detection limit of 1 for Al3+ could reach at 10(-7) mol/L. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.