Pd Doped Ag@C Core-Shell Nanocomposite for Electrochemical Sensitive Determination of Bisphenol A

Abstract

In this work, core–shell structured nanocomposites consisting of Pd doped Ag@C were synthesized by impregnation–reduction method. Then, sensing electrodes were fabricated by modifying Pd/Ag@C core-shell nanoparticles on screen-printed electrodes (SPE) for electrochemical determination of bisphenol A (BPA). The composition and morphology of nanocomposites were characterized by scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, X ray diffraction and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. The electrochemical response characteristics of nanocomposites to BPA was investigated by cyclic voltammetry (CV) and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV). The results indicated that, compared with Ag@C and Pd/C, Pd/Ag@C nanocomposite shows greater catalytic activity to the oxidation of BPA due to the synergistic effect of Pd and Ag. Among the four synthesized Pd/Ag@C-x (x=1-4) nanomaterials, the Pd/Ag@C-3 exhibits the best sensing performance toward the sensitive detection of BPA. The linear range for BPA determination was from 8.0×10-8 M to 1.5×10-5M with a detection limit of 1.0×10-8 M. A less than 9% oxidation peak current change was observed on the determination of BPA using Pd/Ag@C-3/SPE when added different interfering species into the BPA solution. The oxidation peak current attenuation of BPA on Pd/Ag@C-3/SPE within five weeks was found to be less than 3.6%.