Green Synthesis of Full-Color Fluorescent Carbon Nanoparticles from Eucalyptus Twigs for Sensing the Synthetic Food Colorant and Bioimaging

Full-color fluorescent carbon nanoparticles (CNPs) are produced by a facile and green hydrothermal method followed by the differential washing technique. Eucalyptus twigs are used as a precursor to synthesize multiemissive light blue, blue, green, and red CNPs. Brilliant Blue FCF (BB) is a widely used synthetic food colorant, which is toxic for the human body, when consumed beyond the permitted limit. Herein, we demonstrate light blue CNPs as a sensor for selective and sensitive detection of BB via a fluorescence quenching mechanism with a limit of detection of 200 nM. Temperature-dependent fluorescence and H-1 NMR studies confirmed the mechanism as combined dynamic and static quenching. To demonstrate the practical efficacy of the sensor, BB is effectively detected and estimated in selected food samples procured from the market. Moreover, the biocompatibility of light blue and blue CNPs is examined and confirmed by performing a cytotoxicity assay on MDA-MB-231 cell lines. Subsequently, the cellular imaging study is also carried out to explore the internalization process of the CNPs as a function of concentration. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that Eucalyptus twigs, a natural source of high abundance, are used as raw materials and valorized for sensing artificial food color and bioimaging purposes.