Electrochemical reduction and voltammetric determination of metronidazole at a nanomaterial thin film coated glassy carbon electrode

Simple and sensitive electrochemical method for the determination of metronidazole, based on a nanostructured film coated glassy carbon electrode (GCE), is described. Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNT) was dispersed into water in the presence of a hydrophobic surfactant to give very stable and homogeneous MWNT suspension, and a MWNT-film coated GCE was achieved via evaporating solvent. Metronidazole yields a well-defined reduction peak whose potential is -0.71 V at the MWNT-film coated GCE in pH 9.0 Britton-Robinson buffer. Compared with bare GCE. the MWNT-film modified GCE significantly enhances the reduction peak current of metronidazole. All the experimental parameters were optimized for the determination of metronidazole. The detection limit is 6 x 10(-9) mol/1 at 2 min accumulation. This method has been successfully used to determine metronidazole in the drugs. Furthermore, results obtained by the proposed method have been compared with spectrophotometric method. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.