Synthesis and application of a 0D/2D nanocomposite for the nanomolar level detection of an antiandrogen drug

Abstract

In this work, Sr@FeNi–S nanostructures were synthesized through a chemical approach. The as-synthesized nanostructures were explored for the fabrication of a nanocomposite based potentiometric flutamide (FLU) sensor. Conducting graphene nanoribbons (GnRbs) were used for the strong adsorption of the nanocomposite on a graphite (Gr) electrode. The resulting composite matrix Sr@FeNi–S/GnRbs was further used for the electrochemical detection of FLU. The synthesized nanocomposite was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and FT-IR spectroscopy methods. The synergistic effect of the materials employed in the development of the electrode resulted in an efficient FLU sensor with a low detection limit (20 nM) and a wide linear range of 20–450 nM. These results validated the successful development of an electrochemical sensor with superior analytical performance in comparison to the sensors reported in the literature. The proposed sensor also exhibited good storage stability and reproducibility, and remained unaffected by a few common interferents present in biological samples. The developed sensor was also evaluated for flutamide analysis in real samples with a high percentage recovery (96%), thus validating the possibility of its usage in biomedical applications.