Dual biomass-derived porous carbon heterogeneous functionalized mesoporous CuCo 2 O 4 nanocomposite combined with molecularly imprinted polymers as an electrochemical sensing platform for hypersensitive and selective determination of dimetridazole contaminants

In this study, an original molecularly imprinted electrochemical sensor (MIECS) is prepared using layer -by -layer modification of sensitization nanomaterials (CuCo 2 O 4 /BPC- E ) coupled with molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) for the ultrasensitive and rapid determination of dimetridazole (DMZ) contaminants. The biomass waste of eggshell (ES) powders subtly introduced in situ in the carbonization process of psyllium husk (PSH) substantially promotes the physicochemical properties of the resulting biomass -derived porous carbon (BPC- E ). The large specific surface area and abundant pores provide a favourable surface for loading mesoporous CuCo 2 O 4 with a spinel structure. The assembly of CuCo 2 O 4 /BPC- E on the gold electrode (GE) surface enhances the electrochemical sensing signal. The MIPs constructed using DMZ and o -phenylenediamine (oPD) as templates and functional monomers boost the targeted recognition performance of the analyte. The combined DMZ targets then undergo an electrochemical reduction reaction in situ with the transfer of four electrons and four protons. Under optimum conditions, the current response of differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) exhibits two linear ranges for DMZ detection, 0.01 -10 mu M and 10 -200 mu M. The limit of detection (LOD) is 1.8 nM ( S/N = 3) with a sensitivity of 5.724 mu A mu M -1 cm -2 . The obtained MIECS exhibits excellent selectivity, reproducibility, repeatability and stability. This electrochemical sensing system is applied to the detection of real samples (tap water, coarse fodder and swine urine), yielding satisfactory recoveries (90.6% -98.1 %), which are consistent with those obtained via HPLC. This finding verifies that the utility of MIECS for monitoring pharmaceutical and environmental contaminants and ensuring food safety.