Conjugated polymer based fluorescent probes for metal ions

Abstract Metal ions perform significant functions in organisms, while metal pollution does harm to the environment and ultimately affects human health. As a result, the metal ions sensing and monitoring techniques have been the research hotspot in the past decades. Among the different sensing techniques, fluorescent probes utilizing conjugated polymers (CPs) have advantages on metal ions detection, such as high sensitivity, high selectivity and low cost. This work contains a summary of studies about conjugated polymer based sensors towards various metal ions that have been carried out in the last 10 years. Moreover, we put forward some private opinions and outlooks into how this area is developing, and significant challenges to be surmounted.