A new infrared spectroelectrochemical cell for the detection of species generated by platinum and screen-printed carbon electrodes

Abstract

In this paper, we describe a simple and effective infrared (IR) spectroelectrochemical cell for detecting species generated from an electrochemical system featuring low-IR-reflectivity electrodes. The IR detection mode of attenuated total reflection (ATR) was employed to construct the spectroelectrochemical cell. Two kinds of electrodes, platinum (Pt) and screen-printed carbon (SPC), were used to examine the performance of this new cell in detection of electroactive species generated by cyclic voltammetry. Because data generated from highly reflective electrodes are available in the literature, Pt electrode was used to characterize the performances of the developed spectroelectrochemical cell. Results indicated that species generated electrochemically can be observed readily and their responses were comparable to those described in the literature. The cell volume could be lower than 300 μL, which suggests that this approach may be very useful to obtain chemical information during electrochemistry for biological fluids with limited sample volumes. By examining the electrochemical behavior of several amino acids using both Pt and SPC electrodes, the redox behaviors can be readily observed indicating a new spectroelectrochemical cell was successfully developed for the purpose of using of SPC electrode. © 2006 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA.