Simultaneous voltammetric detection of dopamine and uric acid in the presence of high concentration of ascorbic acid using multi-walled carbon nanotubes with methylene blue composite film-modified electrode

Abstract

An electrochemically functional nanocomposite through the adsorption of methylene blue onto the multi-walled nanotubes (MB-MWNTs) was prepared, and a sensitive voltammetric sensor was fabricated. The modified electrode showed excellent electrocatalytic activity toward dopamine (DA) and uric acid (UA) in 0.1 M phosphate solution medium (pH 3.0). Compared to the bare electrode, the MB-MWNTs film-modified electrode not only remarkably enhanced the anodic peak currents of DA and UA, i.e., shifted the anodic peak potential of DA negatively, but also avoided the overlapping of the anodic peaks of DA and UA. The interference of ascorbic acid (AA) was eliminated. Under the optimized conditions, the peak separation between AA and DA and between DA and UA was 219 and 174 mV, respectively. In the presence of 1.0 mM AA and 10.0 μM UA, the anodic peak current was linear to the concentration of DA in the range of 0.4–10.0 μM with a detection limit of 0.2 μM DA. The anodic peak current of UA was linear to the concentration in the range of 2.0–20.0 and 20.0–200.0 μM with a lowest detection limit of 1.0 μM in the presence of 1.0 mM AA and 1.0 μM DA.