Naphthalimide-based Probe for the Detection of Hypochlorite in a Near-perfect Aqueous Solution

A novel fluorescent turn-off sensor JM for hypochlorite was synthesized. JM showed a remarkable selectivity for ClO^− over diverse competitive analytes, including reactive oxygen species (ROS), via deprotonation reaction. Detection limit for ClO^− turned out to be 0.60 μM. Sensor JM successfully determined ClO^− in natural water samples with satisfactory recovery. The sensing mechanism of JM to hypochlorite was demonstrated by fluorescent and UV-visible spectroscopy, ESI-mass, NMR titration and TD-DFT calculations.