Facile synthesis of red-emissive carbon dots with theoretical understanding for cellular imaging

Recently, red emissive carbon dots (R-CDs) have drawn widespread attention on account of their desirable fluorescence properties and good biocompatibility. Despite great efforts, facile synthesis of R-CDs for cellular imaging remains challenging and the fluorescence mechanism of R-CDs is still elusive. Herein, p-phenylenediamine-derived R-CDs with excitation-independency were successfully obtained through a facile solvothermal approach together with proportional precipitation. The fluorescent solvatochromism of R-CDs is realized, while high polarity leads to higher degree of dipole interaction between R-CDs and different solvents, favoring for emissive red-shift. Furthermore, density functional theory is adopted to explore the optical and electronic characteristics of some polycyclic aromatic molecules. Among different configurations, pyridine nitrogen and carbonyl bonds could relatively increase the charge density and significantly narrow the band gap, which can provide a crucial theoretical basis for the precise preparation of R-CDs. Moreover, R-CDs possess favorable cellular imaging ability, which indicates their potential for a promising candidate as fluorescence probes in bioimaging. [Display omitted] •A facile strategy for the synthesis of red-emitting carbon dots (R-CDs) with excitation-independency is developed.•Solvatochromic shifts of R-CDs were studied through ET(30) polarity parameter.•The DFT calculations were employed to investigate the responsible mechanism in fluorescence properties of R-CDs.•The R-CDs show considerable biocompatibility and could be used as a desirable fluorescence probe for cellular imaging.