Modification of glassy carbon electrode with manganese cobalt oxide-cubic like structures incorporated graphitic carbon nitride sheets for the voltammetric determination of 2,4,6-trichlorophenol

Novel cube-like transition metal oxide embedded on graphitic carbon nitride (MCO@GCN) formed a hybrid composite via hydrothermal assisted sonochemical synthesis. The synthesized composite was examined with various physical characterizations such as morphological SEM, EDX, XRD, and FT-IR spectroscopy. The electrocatalytic activity of MCO@GCN composite was further investigated when used to modify a glassy carbon electrode (GCE). The electrochemical sensor was investigated using modified MCO@GCN/GCE towards environmental pollutant 2,4,6-trichlorophenol (2,4,6-TCP) detection with at a potential of (+ 0.654 V vs Ag/AgCl) in pH-7. The structural features have favored a high charge transfer ratio with excellent conductivity which showed a low detection limit (LOD) of 0.0068 RM and sensitivity of 23.57 mu A.mu M-1.cm(-2) comprising a wide linear working range of 0.01-1720 mu M by using differential pulse voltammetry. Besides, the MCO@ GCN/GCE displayed excellent selectivity , repeatability, reproducibility, storage, and operational stability. Notably, the proposed MCO@GCN/GCE was validated with different environmental samples (tap, river, and industrial water) with RSD 0.62-2.86% and 96.51-99.66% (n = 3) recovery.

Automated summary

In this study, a novel hybrid composite of cube-like transition metal oxide embedded on graphitic carbon nitride (MCO@GCN) was synthesized via hydrothermal assisted sonochemical synthesis. The MCO@GCN composite showed excellent electrocatalytic activity and detection performance when used to modify a glassy carbon electrode for environmental pollutant detection.