Fabrication and characterization of a highly sensitive hydroquinone chemical sensor based on iron-doped ZnO nanorods

Abstract

Herein, we report the development of a simple and highly sensitive hydroquinone (HQ) chemical sensor based on an electrochemically activated iron-doped (Fe-doped) zinc oxide nanorod (ZnO NR) modified screen-printed electrode (SPE). The Fe-doped ZnO NRs were prepared using a hydrothermal process and their morphological, crystal, compositional and optical properties were characterized in detail. The detailed characterizations showed that the NRs are densely grown, well-crystalline and possess a wurtzite hexagonal phase. The fabricated HQ electrochemical sensor exhibited high sensitivity of 18.60 μA mM⁻¹ cm⁻² and a very low experimental detection limit of 0.51 μM. Our results demonstrate that simply prepared doped ZnO nanomaterials are promising candidates to fabricate highly sensitive electrochemical sensors.