The examination of ecotoxic effect of folic acid based carbon dots on maize

Abstract

Carbon dots (CDs) are popular and emerging nanomaterial which found application in many fields such as drug delivery, optoelectronic, and imaging due to their high solubility, low cost and easiness of their functionalization. Their effect on plants is not sufficiently investigated, so it is necessary to investigate their ecotoxicity. In this research, CDs prepared from folic acid was used for the treatment of maize plants with two different concentrations. The treatment was performed during the plant growth in hydroponics. ICP method was used for the analysis of macronutrients (Ca, K, Mg, P, S) uptake in plants from the hydroponic medium, which was used for the plant growth. The obtained TPC results demonstrated low oxidative stress proportional to the used concentration, which was not significant. The similar trend was observed in TAA where the only significant increase was in plant shoots after the treatment at 500 µg L-1.