A near-infrared fluorescent probe NIR-Hg, for the detection of Hg2+ ion, has been synthesized directly by condensing Changsha dye with 4-Phenyl-3-thiosemicarbazide and the structure has fully characterized by 1HNMR, 13CNMR, and ESI-MS. The probe has been designed on the basis of the reaction that Hg2+ ion promotes thiosemicarbazide to oxazole in aqueous media and had been induced to produce turn-on fluorescence via an irreversible spirolactam ring-opening process. The probe NIR-Hg has exhibited fast response (1 min), high sensitivity with 44-fo...