Facile synthesis of chitosan-carbon nanofiber composite supported copper nanoparticles for electrochemical sensing of carbendazim

Abstract

The detection of carbendazim (CBZ) is very important due to environmental concern. Hence, the development of efficient electrocatalytic sensors for CBZ is of great interest to researchers. In this work, chitosan-functionalized carbon nanofiber composites were prepared onto which Cu nanoparticles were immobilized (abbreviated as CT-fC-Cu nanocomposites) via a simple sonication approach. The as-prepared CT-fC-Cu nanocomposites were first characterized and then they were fabricated on screen-printed carbon electrode (SPCE) for electrochemical measurements of CBZ by cyclic voltammetry (CV). The electrochemical sensing of biocompatible CT-fC-Cu/SPCE towards CBZ was studied using linear sweep voltammetry (LSV). As expected, the sensors revealed an excellent selectivity of CBZ with an extremely wide linear range of 0.8–277.0 µM where the limit of detection was observed to be 0.028 µM. Finally, the prepared electrode was successfully employed for the analysis of CBZ levels in real soil-washed water samples. • Chitosan-functionalized carbon nanofiber supported Cu particles (CT-fC-Cu) were synthesized. • The fabricated CT-fC-Cu electrode was applied to the electrochemical determination of CBZ. • CT-fC-Cu/SPCE shows a wide linear range, a lower detection limit, and an excellent selectivity. • The biocompatible CT-fC-Cu/SPCE can determine CBZ levels in real environmental samples.