Development of an Electrochemical Sensor for a Sensitive Determination of Metanil Yellow

In this work, we introduced a sensitive electrochemical sensor in order to accurately detect metanil yellow (MY). Multi-walled carbon nanotube-chitosan (MWCNTs-Chit) nanocomposite was applied to fabricate the sensor on the glassy carbon electrode. The scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to investigate the physical morphology of the modified electrode surface. The rate of the electron transfers between MY and electrode can be quickened by the attendance of MWCNTs-Chit nanocomposite due the high surface area, good conductivity as well as excellent catalytic property. Sensitive quantitative detection of the MY was carried out by the monitoring increase of differential pulse voltammetric (DPV) responses of the sensor. The prepared MWCNTs-Chit/GC electrode illustrated a linear response to MY concentration in the range of 1.0 µM to 300.0 µM with a sensitivity and a limit of detection (S/N=3) of 20.0 nAµM-1 and 0.3 µM, respectively. Accordingly, in order to determine MY in real samples with satisfactory results, we applied the proposed sensor.