Research Projects

Selective and sensitive detection of chemical species finds their significance owing to their biological and environmental importance and widespread utility. The deviations from the requisite concentration level of these species impart toxicity to the physiological domain as well as pose hazardous impact to the environment. This promotes the need of their on-site real-time detection and various methodologies have been developed and are been in use in this purpose. However, detection with chemosensing approach augmented with photophysical signal modulation has been advantageous. The design aspect in development of molecular probes as covalent architectures for detection, exploiting the physical and chemical properties of donor site-analyte interactions, follows methodological manifestations to fulfil the criteria of selectivity, sensitivity, reproducibility, stability and repetitiveness parameters; which at instances, jeopardised with constraints of synthetic and operation aspects, deviated accuracies, economic effectiveness and time-consuming. The objective in this proposal to be fulfilled by addressing simultaneously the two predominant issues pertaining to selectivity and sensitivity that have restrictive domain in detection methodology. The sensitivity in detection of analytes, not restricted to detection of metal ions, but is to be extended few molecules of biological and environmental importance, is to be addressed by the advantage features of ratiometric signalling through FRET mechanism. At the same time, generation of in-situ probe molecules through self sorting of available constituents for optimal probe-analyte interaction is to effect high selectivity, in a “let the analyte chose its own molecular probe” methodology based molecular adaptation process. The constitutional library of receptor components, driven by their kinetic and thermodynamic inter-componential selections, and subsequent generation of molecular probes will therefore lead towards simultaneous detection of various analytes at the same time, curtailing the requirement in development of covalently architecture individual molecular probe for each analyte. This approach, in general, should not only facilitate selective and sensitive detection of a particular analyte in a mixed analyte system, but also anticipated to establish a protocol of simultaneous detection through molecular adaptation approach, a methodology for discriminatory analyte detection of structurally and electronically related analogues, a development in methodological evaluative process of molecular probes without their actual synthesis for suitability in chemosensing platform and a subsequent futuristic implementation in real and complex sample analysis in detection technology.