Understanding Norfloxacin’s Turn-On Detection Mechanism: Focusing on Amorphous Carbon-Coated Iron Oxide Nanoparticles

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The excessive utilization of antibiotics poses a significant risk to worldwide human health, underscoring the pressing requirement for sustainable and nonhazardous approaches to detect antibiotics. Accordingly, we created a fluorescent probe that possesses a core–shell structure, which has been meticulously engineered for detecting antibiotics. Our developed probe utilizes amorphous carbon-coated iron oxide nanoparticles (C-IONs) to detect norfloxacin (NOR) with remarkable sensitivity. NOR greatly enhances the fluorescence of C-IONs, rendering it a very efficient pH-responsive sensor. By optimizing the synthesis and experimental parameters, we have effectively established a direct correlation between the fluorescence of C-IONs and the concentration of NOR within the range 0–10 μM. The achieved limit of detection (LOD) is 5.07 μM. C-IONs displayed outstanding morphology, stability, and notable specificity and selectivity toward NOR. The NOR detection in human blood serum yielded recovery rates between 95.1 and 99.5%, with a standard deviation of less than 1.31%. Therefore, the study confirms the efficacy of enhancing the practicality of using carbon-coated metal oxides for fluorescence-based antibiotic detection in actual samples.