Electrochemical deposition of Prussian blue on Nb2CTx MXene modified carbon cloth for the non-enzymatic electrochemical detection of hydrogen peroxide

Abstract

The detection of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) holds significance in the food industry. In this work, carbon cloth (CC) was modified with a novel composite of Nb2CTx MXene and Prussian blue (PB) for the electrochemical detection of H2O2. Nb2CTx was drop casted on CC followed by the electrochemical deposition of PB using chronoamperometry at 0.7 V. It was found that uniform coverage of PB occurred on the underlying Nb2CTx surface. The electrochemical deposition time was optimized by varying the deposition times (240 s, 360 s, 480 s, and 600 s) and the material obtained after deposition for 480 s was found to produce better sensing characteristics towards the detection of H2O2. The Nb2CTx /PB480 modified CC was able to detect H2O2 linearly from 1 µM to 10 µM and from 10 µM to 100 µM with a limit of detection of 200 nM. The sensor was also able to showcase good selectivity to H2O2 even in the presence of interfering molecules like dopamine, ascorbic acid, uric acid, and sodium chloride. In addition, the material exhibited good storage stability, which was observed by the retention of 97 % of activity even after a storage time of 1 week. This material can be applied towards the sensing of H2O2 in milk since pH of the buffer used in the work matches the pH of the milk sample that was used.