An overview on terbium sensitized based-optical sensors/nanosensors for determination of pharmaceuticals

Abstract

Terbium (Tb) ions have a larger radius, versatile coordination geometry, and high affinity to ligands/drugs containing oxygen or hybrid oxygen-nitrogen atoms. Antenna effect, which is intramolecular energy transfer from the excited triplet states of ligand (donor) to emitting level of Tb ion (acceptor) in chelates leads to a strong narrow-band fluorescence with a large stokes shift, high quantum yields, and long decay times. Tb-drug complexes are of great importance regarding development of sensitive and selective detection methods for determination of drugs in biological samples and dosage forms, especially in combination with nanoparticles. Although, a lot of studies have been published on lanthanide- sensitized based systems, there are only limited reports about application of these systems for determination of pharmaceuticals in biological matrices. Therefore, this review study was conducted to focus on almost all Tb sensitized based-optical sensors/nanosensors developed for determination of pharmaceuticals during 2005−2019. The reported sensors/nanosensors are classified into two types of fluorescence and chemiluminescence-based sensors/nanosensors. Details of each reported study were carefully explained and relevant analytical parameters of the developed methods were also tabulated.

KEYWORDS:

• Sensor
• terbium
• antenna effect
• nanoparticles
• analytical methods
• biological fluids

Acknowledgement

This work was supported and funded by Tehran University of Medical Sciences and Health Services Grant no 50022.