The development of more accurate and effective system for the mercury detection is paramount to overcome severe health issues and environmental toxicity. The current investigation reports a highly sensitive technique for rapid colorimetric Hg(II) detection from environmental aqueous samples using Ag NPs functionalised with polyethylene glycol (PEG) in presence of arginine (arg). Ag NPs were characterised by TEM, EDS, UV–visible spectrophotometer, zeta analyser, FT-IR analysis, particle size analyser and XRD. PEG functionalised particles showed zeta potential of 32.32 ± 4 mV. The effective size of NPs was 11 ± 1.4 nm. The yellowish brown colour of the particles were changed to colourless instantly upon Hg(II) addition in arg presence. Excellent linear relationship (y = −0.0021x + 1.3943, correlation co-efficient R² = 0.9836) was found between absorbance at 396 nm and 20 to 100 nM dilutions of Hg(II). The impact of salinity, pH and temperature on detection of Hg(II) was also performed. Gel and Paper strip were developed which showed highly specific colorimetric detection towards Hg(II). The reported probe can be applied for colorimetric detection and estimation of Hg(II) present in aqueous samples at nano molar level.

开发更准确有效的汞检测系统对于克服严重的健康问题和环境毒性至关重要。当前的研究报告了一种高度灵敏的技术，用于在精氨酸（arg）存在的情况下使用经聚乙二醇（PEG）官能化的Ag NP从环境含水样品中进行比色Hg（II）快速检测。Ag NPs可以通过TEM，EDS，紫外可见分光光度计，ζ分析仪，FT-IR分析，粒度分析仪和XRD进行表征。PEG官能化的颗粒显示出32.32±4 mV的zeta电位。NP的有效尺寸为11±1.4 nm。在arg存在下添加Hg（II）后，颗粒的黄褐色立即变为无色。出色的线性关系（y = −0.0021x + 1.3943，相关系数R ² 在396 nm的吸光度和20至100 nM的Hg（II）稀释度之间发现= 0.9836）。还进行了盐度，pH和温度对Hg（II）检测的影响。凝胶和纸条的开发对Hg（II）表现出高度特异性的比色检测。所报道的探针可用于比色检测和以纳米摩尔水平估算含水样品中存在的Hg（II）。