Electrochemical sensing of methotrexate in the presence of folic acid using PAMAM dendrimer-functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotube-modified electrode

Abstract

This works presents a novel electrochemical sensor based on the third-generation poly(amidoamine) dendrimer (G3 PAMAM)-functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)-modified screen-printed graphite electrode (SPGE) for the simple and sensitive detection of methotrexate (MTX). The carboxylated MWCNTs were covalently functionalized with amino groups of G3 PAMAM and characterized using different techniques. The sensing ability of the designed nanosensor (MWCNTs-PAMAM/SPGE) was tested using differential pulse voltammetry (DPV), chronoamperometry (CHA), linear sweep voltammetry (LSV), and cyclic voltammetry (CV). To investigate the electrocatalytic activity of PAMAM-functionalized MWCNTs, a comparative electrochemical analysis was carried out and it was determined that PAMAM-functionalized MWCNT-modified SPGE showed good electrocatalytic performance for MTX oxidation compared to the unmodified SPGE. The MWCNT-PAMAM/SPGE lead to a reduced overpotential of MTX oxidation of about 300 mV and enhanced current of about 9 μA of the unmodified SPGE. Experiments were performed for the quantitative determination of MTX using the DPV technique. The response peak current linearly related against MTX concentration in the ranges from 0.01 to 110.0 μM and a limit of detection (LOD) equal to 0.003 μM. Also, MWCNT-PAMAM/SPGE exhibits good catalytic ability toward MTX determination in the presence of folic acid (FA), and the separation of their oxidation peaks (peak potential difference = 320 mV) simultaneously detected the above compounds. To prove the applicability of the MWCNT-PAMAM/SPGE sensor, the concentrations of MTX and FA in pharmaceutical products and biological samples were determined. The calculated recoveries were close to 100%, which indicates that the method might be assumed to be accurate.