Microfluidic Detection of Multiple Heavy Metal Ions Using Fluorescent Chemosensors

A great deal of effort has been made to develop devices and methods for detecting toxic heavy metals and their compounds. Traditionally, methods such as mass spectrometry and atomic absorption spectrometry have been used for the detection of these heavy metal ions. However, in spite of their superb sensitivity, the equipment used in these methods can be operated only by experts and requires pre-treatment steps taking more than 10 hours. On the other hand, spectrophoto-metric methods have often been used for the determination of metal ions, due to their advantages of simplicity and inexpensive instrumentation. However, they cannot be used in practice because of their lack of sensitivity and selectivity. Many improved techniques including electrochemical sensors,