Analytical Applications of Bile Acid-derived Soft Materials

Abstract

Supramolecular gels are soft materials with solid-like properties such as supporting weight and retaining shape; and some liquid-like features which make them injectable, printable, etc. On the other hand, lanthanide-based probes have been extensively used in analytical chemistry due to their unique and useful features such as sharp, line-like emission, long excited-state lifetimes, large Stokes shifts, antenna effect, etc. In this thesis, we have used supramolecular metallogels formed by integrating lanthanides with bile salts as a matrix for sensitive detection of natural antioxidants (gallate derived green tea polyphenols) and clinically important glycosidases. This work also presents a user-friendly, low-cost, and instrument-free approach to sensing these analytes using gel immobilized paper sensors with the potential to serve as a rapid test for detecting these analytes in real samples in resource limited areas.