Simple triphenylamine-based luminophore as a hypochlorite chemosensor

Hypochlorous acid is one of the reactive oxygen species in living cells, and plays critical roles in the immune system. In this paper, we present a simple method to detect hypochlorite (OCl−) with high selectivity and sensitivity, by utilizing the oxidative deoximation reaction of luminescent oxim (1, “on”) to its corresponding nonluminescent aldehyde (2, “off”). The obtained results demonstrated that the utilization of the controllable adjustment of the electron-withdrawing ability of the acceptors linked to a luminophore in the presence of some analytes, accompanying with the changed fluorescent signal from “on” to “off”, might be a good approach to develop many new chemosensors with good performance.