Silver(I) ion selective ionophores containing dithiocarbamoyl moieties on steroid backbone

Tweezer-type and non-tweezer-type ionophores containing dithiocarbamoyl groups on a 7-deoxycholic amide or cholane derivatives were designed and synthesized. Potentiometric evaluation of the poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) membranes containing those deoxycholic amides/cholanes linked with tweezer-type dithiocarbamoyl moieties showed excellent affinity and selectivity to silver(I) ion over alkali, alkaline earth and other transition metal cations. On the other hand, deoxycholic amides/cholanes substituted with one dithiocarbamoyl group, i.e., non-tweezer-type ionophores, resulted in relatively poor potentiometric sensitivity and detection limits. The enhanced potentiometric properties of newly synthesized tweezer-type dithiocarbamoyl containing ionophores have been further improved by employing silver ion complexing reagent in the internal reference solution, which resulted in greatly reduced detection limit (∼100 ppt) for the electrodes based on them.