摘要Mercury is a threatening pollutant in food,herein,we developed a Tb3+-nucleic acid probe-based label-free assay for mix-and-read,rapid detection of mercury pollution.The assay utilized the feature of light-up fluorescence of terbium ions(Tb3+)via binding with single-strand DNA.Mercury ion,Hg2+induced thymine(T)-rich DNA strand to form a double-strand structure(T-Hg2+-T),thus leading to fluorescence reduction.Based on the principle,Hg2+can be quantified based on the fluorescence of Tb3+,the limit of detection was 0.068 9 μmol/L and the linear range was 0.1-6.0 μmol/L.Due to the specificity of T-Hg2+-T artificial base pair,the assay could distinguish Hg2+from other metal ions.The recovery rate was ranged in 98.71％-101.34％for detecting mercury pollution in three food samples.The assay is low-cost,separation-free and mix-to-read,thus was a competitive tool for detection of mercury pollution to ensure food safety.