Immobilization of cobalt phthalocyanine-imbedded electrospun nanofibers on a gold electrode for the electrocatalytic detection of mercury(II)

This research study describes the nanofabrication of electrospun nanofibers (ENFs) containing a coumarin tetra-substituted cobalt phthalocyanine (CoPc-cou), polyaniline (PANI) and polyvinyl alcohol (PVA). This nanocomposite was used to modify a gold substrate which was followed by the immobilisation of a 5 % Nafion (Nf) solution affording the CoPc-cou-ENFs-Nf|Au modified electrode. Comparison of the chemically modified electrode (CME) with the bare and other modified electrodes shows that the CME under optimised conditions displayed superior detection of Hg(II) attaining a linear range of 10 – 3000 µM. Furthermore, the CME exhibits selectivity and sensitivity in an interference sample containing multiple heavy metals. A good percentage recovery of 96 % was attained when the CoPc-cou-ENFs-Nf|Au electrode was applied to a real water sample which was comparable to a percentage recovery of 98 % which was attained using the ICP-OES to analyse the same water samples.