Highly sensitive electro-oxidative voltammetric determination of anthelmintic drug albendazole using porous graphitic carbon nitride sensor infused with cationic micellar solution

Abstract

A sensitive and novel electrochemical senser, acetyl trimethylammonium bromide (CTAB)-immobilized nitrogen rich g-C3N4 nanosheet modified carbon paste electrode was developed, for the electrochemical investigation of the anthelmintic drug Albendazole (ABZ) using voltammetric tools like cyclic and square wave voltammetry. The results showed that the modified carbon paste electrode exhibited remarkable electro-catalytic action towards the electrochemical oxidation of ABZ in a phosphate buffer solution at pH 3 compared to bare carbon paste electrode. The electrode material was characterized by CV, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscope (AFM), and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). A highly sensitive square wave voltammetric technique was developed for the determination of ABZ, at a trace level with great precision and accuracy, good limit of detection (LOD) 0.01 µM and limit of quantification (LOQ) of 0.036 µM, in the concentration range of 0.2–10 µM. This approach can be used in pharmaceutical formulations for clinical diagnosis, quality assurance, and drug screening. In addition, this technique is also implemented for the assessment of ABZ in water samples and biological samples like urine and blood plasma.