posted on 2021-04-06, 17:09authored byDeming Dong, Tianjiao Liu, Dapeng Liang, Xipeng Jin, Zihan Qi, Anfeng Li, Yang Ning
The judgment of microalgae viability
is a vital procedure in the
process of microalgae culture and treatment, which also plays an important
role in bioremediation, bioindication, and pharmacology fields. The
current conventional methods for defining living/dead microalgal cells
are complicated or laborious. Hence, developing a simple and reliable
detection method for microalgae viability is still challenging. Here,
we developed chlorella-based carbonized polymer dots (c-CPDs) by a
hydrothermal method. Due to their small average size of 5.0 nm, obvious
excitation-dependent emission, stable fluorescence properties, and
low toxicity, c-CPDs could be used for distinguishing living or dead
chlorella by testing different fluorescence characteristics of c-CPD-labeled
chlorella. Compared with conventional cellular dyes used for differentiating
living/dead microalgae, c-CPDs significantly reduced toxicity, showing
good sensitivity and reliability. This work provided a method to prepare
environmentally friendly carbon dots (CDs) using microalgae, which
had potential to be prepared on a large scale and might be applied
feasibly in the preparation of doped CDs by controlling the growth
of chlorella.