Oxidase-like activity of magnetically separable nano ceria for catechol detection

Abstract

The present work demonstrates the use of novel properties of ceria magnetic nanoparticles (CeO2–Fe3O4 NPs) as oxidase mimetics to detect catechol. The CeO2–Fe3O4 NPs was prepared by simple co-precipitation method. The prepared nanoparticles were confirmed by different techniques such as FTIR, XRD, SEM–EDS, and XPS. CeO2–Fe3O4 NPs exhibits similar activity as tyrosinase enzyme to catalyse the oxidation of colorless catechol to colored quinone complex, which provides colorimetric detection of catechol. Characterization techniques show that the oxidase activity of the CeO2–Fe3O4 NPs initiates due to Ce4+/Ce3+ and quinone complex formation by catechol ligand. In addition, CeO2–Fe3O4 NPs can be easily separated from the reaction solution by using a magnet and reused for the next cycle.