Determination of uric acid in co-presence of dopamine and ascorbic acid using cuprous oxide nanoparticle-functionalized graphene decorated glassy carbon electrode

Abstract

Cuprous oxide nanoparticles (Cu2O NPs) were dispersed into a graphene oxide (GO) solution to form a homogeneous Cu2O-GO dispersion. After this, the cuprous oxide nanoparticles were functionalized to electrochemically reduce the graphene oxide decorated glassy carbon electrode (Cu2O-ErGO/GCE). This was prepared by coating the Cu2O-GO dispersion onto the surface of the glassy carbon electrode (GCE), which was followed by a potentiostatic reduction process. An irreversible two-electron reaction of uric acid (UA) was observed at the voltammetric sensor. Moreover, the high concentrations of dopamine (DA) and ascorbic acid (AA) hardly affected the peak current of UA, which suggested that Cu2O-ErGO/GCE have excellent selectivity for UA. This is probably because the response peaks of the three compounds are well-separated from each other. The oxidation peak current was proportional to the concentration of UA in the ranges of 2.0 nM−0.6 µM and 0.6 µM−10 µM, respectively, with a low limit of detection (S/N = 3, 1.0 nM) after an accumulation time of 120 s. Cu2O-ErGO/GCE was utilized for the rapid detection of UA in human blood serum and urine samples with satisfactory results.