An extremely sensitive monoboronic acid based fluorescent sensor for glucose Original Research Article

An extremely sensitive monoboronic acid based fluorescent sensor for glucose was developed. This was carried out by assembling a fluorescent monoboronic acid, 3-aminophenylboronic acid (PBA) indirectly onto gold surface via its electrostatic interaction with cysteine (Cys) that was directly assembled on the gold surface. The formation of self-assembled bilayers (SAB) was confirmed and primarily characterized by cyclic voltammetry and X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS). The SAB containing PBA was found fluorescent and its fluorescence showed an extremely high sensitivity to the presence of glucose and other monosaccharides such as galactose and fructose with quenching constants at 108 M−1 order of magnitude compared to those at 102 M−1 in bulk solutions. The quenching constants were found to vary in the order of d-glucose>d-galactose>d-fructose>d-mannose that is different from that in bulk solution which shows the highest binding affinity toward d-fructose and very low sensitivity toward glucose. The reported monoboronic acid based SAB fluorescent sensor showed the highest sensitivity towards glucose with the capacity of detecting saccharides of concentration down to nanomolar level. It was also demonstrated that the fluorescence from PBA/Cys/Au can be easily recovered after each measurement event and therefore also represents a new reusable method for immobilizing reagent in fabricating chemosensors.