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Abstract: An easy prepared fluorescence turn-on and colorimetric dual channel probe was developed for rapid assay of Hg2+ ions with high sensitivity and selectivity by using poly(acrylic acid)-templated silver nanoclusters (PAA-AgNCs). The PAA-AgNCs exhibited weak fluorescence, while upon the addition of Hg2+ ions, AgNCs gives a dramatic increase in fluorescence as a result of the changes of the AgNCs states. The detection limit was estimated to be 2nM, which is much lower than the Hg2+ detection requirement for drinking water of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the turn-on sensing mode offers additional advantage to efficiently reduce background noise. Also, a colorimetric assay of Hg2+ ions can be realized due to the observed absorbance changes of the AgNCs. More importantly, the method was successfully applied to the determination of Hg2+ ions in real water samples, which suggests our proposed method has a great potential of application in environmental monitoring. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This section offers biotechnical news briefs as of August 2011. A comparison made during a U.S. Department of Energy workshop held in Albuquerque, New Mexico showed that solar cells are more productive than photosynthesis. Researcher at the Riken Ornics Science Center in Japan had accurately and quantitatively measured gene expression levels using only 100 nannograms (ng) of total RNA. Researchers from Zheijiang University, Hangzhou, China reported a different way of acrylic acid production coupled with electricity generation.