A micro electrochemical sensor with porous copper-clusters for total nitrogen determination in freshwaters

Author

Yang Li ; Jizhou Sun ; Chao Bian ; Jianhua Tong ; Shanhong Xia

Author_Institution

State Key Lab. of Transducer Technol., Inst. of Electron., Beijing, China

fYear

2013

fDate

7-10 April 2013

Firstpage

76

Lastpage

79

Abstract

A micro electrochemical sensor has been developed for total nitrogen (TN) determination in freshwaters. After the digestion process of water samples, nitrate was detected with the microsensor modified by porous copper-clusters and the concentration of TN was calculated by a portable electrochemical system. As the electrocatalyst material, copper was electrodeposited onto the working-electrode of the microsensor by cyclic voltammetry (CV) method and square-wave pulsating current (PC) method. It was found that copper layer fabricated by PC method was open porous and performed higher sensitivity in nitrate detection than that fabricated by CV method. Calibration in digested samples showed that microsensors modified by PC method had sensitivity of 7.3104 μA/mg L^-1 and limit of detection (LOD) of 0.1 mg/L for TN determination. Concentrations of TN in 7 samples from lakes and rivers were detected using the portable electrochemical system. The results were in good agreement with the data obtained by standard TN measurement method.

Keywords

calibration; catalysts; electrochemical electrodes; electrochemical sensors; electrodeposition; geochemistry; hydrological equipment; lakes; microfabrication; microsensors; porous materials; portable instruments; rivers; voltammetry (chemical analysis); CV method; Cu; N; PC method; TN measurement method; calibration; chemical concentration detection; copper layer fabrication; cyclic voltammetry; electrocatalyst material; electrodeposition; freshwater; lake; limit of detection; microelectrochemical sensor; open porous layer; porous copper cluster; portable electrochemical system; pulsating current; river; total nitrogen determination; water sample digestion process; working electrode; Copper; Electrodes; Microsensors; Nitrogen; Sensitivity; Standards; Surface morphology; micro electrochemical sensor; porous copper-clusters; square-wave pulsating current electrodeposition; total nitrogen determination;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Nano/Micro Engineered and Molecular Systems (NEMS), 2013 8th IEEE International Conference on

Conference_Location

Suzhou

Electronic_ISBN

978-1-4673-6351-8

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/NEMS.2013.6559686

Filename

6559686