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Fabrication of ionic liquid stabilized MXene interface for electrochemical dopamine detection

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Abstract

Development of MXene (Ti3C2Cl2)-based sensing platforms by exploiting their inherent active electrochemistry is highly challenging due to their characteristic poor stability in air and water. Herein, we report a cost-effective methodology to deposit MXene on a conductive graphitic pencil electrode (GPE). MXenes can provide active surface area due to their clever morphology of accordion-like sheets; however, the disposition to stack together limits their potential applications. A task-specific ionic liquid (1-methyl imidazolium acetate) is utilized as a multiplex host material to engineer MXene interface via π-π interactions as well as to act as a selective binding site for biomolecules. The resulting IL-MXene/GPE interface proved to be a highly stable interface owing to good interactions between MXene and IL that inhibited electrode leaching and boosted electron transfer at the electrode–electrolyte interface. It resulted in robust dopamine (DA) oxidation with amplified faradaic response and enhanced sensitivity (9.61 µA µM−1 cm−2) for DA detection. This fabricated sensor demonstrated large linear range (10 µM − 2000 µM), low detection limit (702 nM), high reproducibility, and good selectivity. We anticipate that such platform will pave the way for the development of stable and economically viable MXene-based sensors without sacrificing their inherent properties.

Graphical abstract

Scheme 1 Schematic illustration of the IL-MXene/GPE fabrication and oxidative process towards non-enzymatic dopamine sensor

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Acknowledgements

UA acknowledges the financial support provided by HEC under the indigenous Ph.D. 5000 fellowship program (2PS5-179)/HEC/IS/2019) to pursue her Ph.D. at BZU Multan. MHN acknowledges the financial support provided by HEC (20-4993/R&D/HEC/14/614) and CUI (16-14/CRGP/CIIT/LHR/15/776).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Interdisciplinary Research Centre in Biomedical Materials (IRCBM), COMSATS University Islamabad, Lahore Campus, Lahore, 54000, Pakistan

    Umay Amara, Akhtar Hayat & Mian Hasnain Nawaz

  2. Institute of Chemical Sciences, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, 60800, Pakistan

    Umay Amara & Khalid Mahmood

  3. School of Chemical and Materials Engineering (SCME), National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST), Islamabad, H-12, Pakistan

    Bilal Sarfraz & Muhammad Taqi Mehran

  4. Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, Khyber Medical University, Peshawar, Pakistan

    Nawshad Muhammad

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  1. Umay Amara
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Amara, U., Sarfraz, B., Mahmood, K. et al. Fabrication of ionic liquid stabilized MXene interface for electrochemical dopamine detection. Microchim Acta 189, 64 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-022-05162-3

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