A highly selective Cd‐based metal‐organic framework fluorescent probe for rapid recognition of cephalothin in water

Nowadays, the problem of antibiotic pollution in the water environment is becoming more and more serious, which has caused great harm to human health and the circulatory system. Therefore, it is extremely crucial to design an effective and sensitive method for the recognition of antibiotics in water. In this research, 1‐(4‐carboxyphenyl)‐1H‐pyrazole‐3‐carboxylic acid (H2L) was used as a ligand to prepare a luminescent two‐dimensional (2D) metal–organic framework (MOF), CdL·H2O (1). 1 can specifically recognize antibiotic cephalothin (CET) in aqueous environments through a fluorescence‐enhanced response, which demonstrated a favorable linear correlation between the fluorescence intensities of 1 and the concentrations of CET (0–50 μM) with a linear fluorescence enhancement slope KEC value of 5.4750 × 104 M−1 and a limit of detection (LOD) of 165 nM. The fast response, good selectivity, anti‐interference ability, and reusability for CET recognition were also verified. 1 represents the inaugural MOF‐based fluorescent material designed for the recognition of CET. Additionally, the detection mechanism for CET was explored in detail with a view to better understanding the fluorescence sensing process.