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Additively manufactured carbon/black-integrated polylactic acid 3Dprintedsensor for simultaneous quantification of uric acid and zinc in sweat

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Abstract

For the first time the development of an electrochemical method for simultaneous quantification of Zn2+ and uric acid (UA) in sweat is described using an electrochemically treated 3D-printed working electrode. Sweat analysis can provide important information about metabolites that are valuable indicators of biological processes. Improved performance of the 3D-printed electrode was achieved after electrochemical treatment of its surface in an alkaline medium. This treatment promotes the PLA removal (insulating layer) and exposes carbon black (CB) conductive sites. The pH and the square-wave anodic stripping voltammetry technique were carefully adjusted to optimize the method. The peaks for Zn2+ and UA were well-defined at around − 1.1 V and + 0.45 V (vs. CB/PLA pseudo-reference), respectively, using the treated surface under optimized conditions. The calibration curve showed a linear range of 1 to 70 µg L−1 and 1 to 70 µmol L−1 for Zn2+ and UA, respectively. Relative standard deviation values were estimated as 4.8% (n = 10, 30 µg L−1) and 6.1% (n = 10, 30 µmol L−1) for Zn2+ and UA, respectively. The detection limits for Zn2+ and UA were 0.10 µg L−1 and 0.28 µmol L−1, respectively. Both species were determined simultaneously in real sweat samples, and the achieved recovery percentages were between 95 and 106% for Zn2+ and 82 and 108% for UA.

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Funding

This research was supported by Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) (Grant numbers: 2007/08244-5, 2007/54829-5, 2014/50867-3, 2017/18574-4, 2018/14462-0, and 2020/00325-0), Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) (Pró-Forenses Edital 25/2014) and Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) (Grant Number: 305605/2017-8, 307172-2017-0, 311847/2018-8, 465389/2014-7 – INCTBio and 302839/2020-8).

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Author notes

  1. Vanessa N. Ataide and Diego P. Rocha contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Chemistry, Department of Fundamental Chemistry, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, 05508-000, Brazil

    Vanessa N. Ataide, Diego P. Rocha, Thiago R. L. C. Paixão & Lucio Angnes

  2. Institute of Physics “Gleb Wataghin”, Applied Physics Department, State University of Campinas, Campinas, SP, 13083-859, Brazil

    Abner de Siervo

  3. Institute of Chemistry, Federal University of Uberlândia, Uberlândia, MG, 38400-902, Brazil

    Rodrigo A. A. Muñoz

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  1. Vanessa N. Ataide
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Correspondence to Diego P. Rocha.

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Ataide, V.N., Rocha, D.P., de Siervo, A. et al. Additively manufactured carbon/black-integrated polylactic acid 3Dprintedsensor for simultaneous quantification of uric acid and zinc in sweat. Microchim Acta 188, 388 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-021-05007-5

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