Recent Development of Carbon Quantum Dots: Biological Toxicity, Antibacterial Properties and Application in Foods

ABSTRACT

Carbon quantum dots (CQDs) are category of novel carbon nanomaterials, which have gradually attracted attention due to their unique properties. CQDs have obvious advantages such as water solubility, modifiability, photochemical property, easy surface modification, antibacterial activity and good biocompatibility. In this paper, the formation mechanism and doping synthesis methods of CQDs are summarized. This review also highlights the biological toxicity, antibacterial properties and application of CQDs in the detection of heavy metals, antibiotics, pathogens, pesticide residues and prohibited additives in food, nutritional functional components, and fresh-keeping of fruits and vegetables.

KEYWORDS:

• CQDs
• heteroatom doping
• biological toxicity
• food detection
• antibacterial activity

Acknowledgments

We acknowledge the financial support from the National Key R&D Program of China (Contract No. 2017YFD0400501), the 111 Project (BP0719028), the Yangzhou City Agricultural Key R&D Program (No.YZ2019034), the Jiangsu Province Key Laboratory Project of Advanced Food Manufacturing Equipment and Technology (No. FMZ202003) and Jiangsu Province “Collaborative Innovation Center for Food Safety and Quality Control” Industry Development Program.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China [No. 2017YFD0400501].