Molecularly imprinted polyaniline-polyvinyl sulphonic acid composite based sensor for para-nitrophenol detection

We report results of the studies relating to the fabrication and characterization of a conducting polymer based molecularly imprinted para-nitrophenol (PNP) sensor. A water pollutant, para-nitrophenol is electrochemically imprinted with polyvinyl sulphonic acid (PVSA) doped polyaniline onto indium tin oxide (ITO) glass substrate. This PNP imprinted electrode (PNPI-PANI-PVSA/ITO) prepared via chronopotentiometric polymerization and over-oxidation is characterized by Fourier transform infra-red spectroscopy (FT-IR), UV-visible (UV-vis) spectroscopy, contact angle (CA), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), cyclic voltammetry (CV) and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) studies. The response studies of PNPI-PANI-PVSA/ITO electrode carried out using DPV reveal a lower detection limit of 1 x 10(-3) mM, improved sensitivity as 1.5 x 10(-3) A mM(-1) and stability of 45 days. The PNPI-PANI-PVSA/ITO electrode shows good precision with relative standard deviation of 2.1% and good reproducibility with standard deviation of 3.78%. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.