Electrical study of a novel pyrene boned graphene nanoribbon film and its specific aniline sensing feature

•A novel cove-GNRs-Pyrene (cGNRs-Pyrene) has been successfully synthesized with showed unique fluorescence property and a optical bandgap of 2.09 eV, using a “bottom-up” liquid phase method.•The FET array devices based on cGNRs-Pyrene films display exceptional output and transmission characteristics, with an on/off ratio as high as 1838, thanks to the superior electrical properties of graphene nanoribbons.•With a detection limit of 0.3 nM/L for aniline, cGNRs-Pyrene demonstrates effective fluorescence quenching due to its wide conjugated π-surface and strong 500 nm emission peak.•The cGNRs-Pyrene has good recognition selectivity and excellent recycling for aniline, and the amount of aniline is one equivalent of cGNRs-Pyrene, the fluorescence quenching efficiency reached 62%. Sensitive, rapid, and recyclable opto-electrically integrated multi-response nanomaterials are needed for public health and safety. Graphene nanoribbons are potential candidates for optoelectronic integrated sensors attributed to their intriguing electrical and optical characteristics. In the research, liquid-phase bottom-up synthesis produced a luminous cove-type graphene nanoribbon (cGNRs-Pyrene) containing alkyl chains and pyrene functional groups at the edge. The FET array devices based on cGNRs-Pyrene films show impressive output and transport properties, with an on/off ratio of up to 1838, caused by the high conductivity of graphene nanoribbons. Surprisingly, cGNRs-Pyrene exhibits excellent fluorescence quenching sensing properties for aniline with a detection limit of 0.3 nM·L−1, and the fluorescence quenching efficiency of cGNRs-Pyrene can as high as 62% with the addition of 1 equivalent of aniline. More interestingly, after adding acid to the cGNRs-Pyrene-aniline solution, the fluorescence intensity of cGNRs-Pyrene can be restored to the initial value, showing the excellent recyclability of cGNRs-Pyrene. This study demonstrates that fluorescent cGNRs-Pyrene has the potential to realize a composite dual-channel high-sensitivity opto-electrically integrated sensor, building a new generation of highly sensitive multi-channel responsive sensors with both electrical and optical sensing.