Electrochemical oxidation determination and voltammetric behaviour of 4-nitrophenol based on Cu2O nanoparticles modified glassy carbon electrode

Cu2O nanoparticles (nano-Cu2O) modified glassy carbon electrode (GCE) was fabricated and used to investigate the electrochemical behaviour of 4-nitrophenol (4-NP) by cyclic voltammetry (CV), chronoamperometry (CA), chronocoulometry (CC) and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV). Compared with GCE, a remarkable increase in oxidation peak current was observed. It indicates that nano-Cu2O exhibits remarkable enhancement effect on the electrochemical oxidation of 4-NP. Under the optimised experimental conditions, the oxidation peak currents were propotional to 4-NP concentration in the range from 1.0 x 10(-6) to 4.0 x 10(-4) mol L-1 with a detection limit of 5.0 x 10(-7) mol L-1 (S/N = 3). The fabricated electrode presented good repeatability, stability and anti-interference. Finally, the proposed method was applied to determine 4-NP in water samples. The recoveries for these samples were from 94.60% to 105.5%.