Abstract
Direct preparation of silver nanoclusters is of great significance for their applications. In this work, by selecting sodium cyanoborohydride as a weak reducing agent to control the kinetics of the reduction reaction, we successfully prepared silver nanoclusters protected by thiol-containing ligands, including mercaptosuccinic acid, cysteine, and glutathione. Based on the silver nanoclusters protected by mercaptosuccinic acid, silver-gold alloy nanoclusters were obtained through a gold doping reaction. Spectroscopic and particle size analyses showed that the silver-gold alloy nanoclusters exhibited aggregation-induced emission enhancement (AIEE) properties. A fluorescent probe for aluminum ions was developed based on the silver-gold alloy nanoclusters. In the presence of methionine and mercaptoacetic acid, the probe demonstrated good selectivity for aluminum ion detection. The linear range of this detection method was 0 to 192 μM, with a detection limit of 1.6 μM. The working mechanism of this detection method was further investigated through spectroscopic analysis.