Voltammetric determination of mercury in biological samples using crown ether/multiwalled carbon nanotube-based sensor
By Rabeay Y.A. Hassan and Manal S. Kamel and Hassan N.A. Hassan and Elmorsy Khaled
Published in Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry
2015
Abstract
An electrochemical assay for sensitive and selective determination of mercury was suggested. Preparation, characterization, and testing of the electro-catalytic activity of Crown-ether/multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs)/CPEs were performed. The voltammetric responses of modified electrodes with various sensing elements and nanomaterials were carefully investigated. Consequently, improving the sensitivity and selectivity were achieved using a combination of 12-crown-4-ether and \MWCNTs\ (10% w/w for each). A linear response was observed from 5 to 110 ?g/ml, with the detection limit (S/N = 3) of 0.25 ?g/ml. The method was interference free from many species and successfully applied for the determination of mercury in blood, urine or tab-water samples with a high accuracy and precision comparable with the reference method (Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy AAS).