Micellular fluorescence resonance energy transfer based fluorescent ratiometric response to hydrocarbon analytes

Fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) has been utilised to develop numerous selective and sensitive fluorescent ratiometric sensors. Typically, FRET-based fluorescent ratiometric sensors rely on chemical interactions between the sensor and analyte to illicit a response, thus unreactive hydrocarbons are a neglected analyte and a source for new sensors. By containing an unbound donor–acceptor system within micelles, energy transfer is enabled by spatial confinement. This offers the potential of a ratiometric response as a hydrocarbon analyte is added. Introducing a hydrocarbon analyte to this system causes micelles to swell, increasing the donor–acceptor distance and thus reducing the amount of observed energy transfer. We present InP/ZnS quantum dot donors interacting with a Nile Red acceptor, confined by cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB)-based micelles. We alleviated spatial confinement of the pair within micelles using common laboratory solvents to represent hydrocarbons, (toluene, hexane and octadecene). We constructed calibration curves for each solvent and found effective sensing ranges of 0.009–0.21, 0.008–0.27 and 0.003–0.06 M for toluene, hexane and octadecene, respectively. This study contributes towards the development of new hydrocarbon sensors utilising this new mechanism.