A screen-printed electrode modified with gold nanoparticles/cellulose nanocrystals for electrochemical detection of 4,4'-methylene diphenyl diamine

Duygu Büyüktaş; Masoud Ghaani; Cesare Rovera; Daniele Carullo; Richard T Olsson; Figen Korel; Stefano Farris

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e15327

A screen-printed electrode modified with gold nanoparticles/cellulose nanocrystals for electrochemical detection of 4,4'-methylene diphenyl diamine

Heliyon. 2023 Apr 6;9(4):e15327. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e15327. eCollection 2023 Apr.

Authors

Duygu Büyüktaş^{1

2}, Masoud Ghaani², Cesare Rovera², Daniele Carullo², Richard T Olsson³, Figen Korel¹, Stefano Farris^{2

4}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Food Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Izmir Institute of Technology, 35430, Gülbahçe Köyü, Urla, Izmir, Turkey.
² DeFENS, Department of Food, Environmental and Nutritional Sciences, Food Packaging Lab., University of Milan, via Celoria 2 - I, 20133, Milan, Italy.
³ Department of Fibre and Polymer Technology, School of Chemical Science and Engineering, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Teknikringen 56, SE-100 44, Stockholm, Sweden.
⁴ INSTM, National Consortium of Materials Science and Technology, Local Unit University of Milan, via Celoria 2 - I, 20133, Milan, Italy.

Abstract

Developing simple, cost-effective, easy-to-use, and reliable analytical devices if of utmost importance for the food industry for rapid in-line checks of their products that must comply with the provisions set by the current legislation. The purpose of this study was to develop a new electrochemical sensor for the food packaging sector. More specifically, we propose a screen-printed electrode (SPE) modified with cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) and gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) for the quantification of 4,4'-methylene diphenyl diamine (MDA), which is one of the most important PAAs that can transfer from food packaging materials into food stuffs. The electrochemical performance of the proposed sensor (AuNPs/CNCs/SPE) in the presence of 4,4'-MDA was evaluated using cyclic voltammetry (CV). The modified AuNPs/CNCs/SPE showed the highest sensitivity for 4,4'-MDA detection, with a peak current of 9.81 μA compared with 7.08 μA for the bare SPE. The highest sensitivity for 4,4'-MDA oxidation was observed at pH = 7, whereas the detection limit was found at 57 nM and the current response of 4,4'-MDA rose linearly as its concentration increased from 0.12 μM to 100 μM. Experiments using real packaging materials revealed that employing nanoparticles dramatically improved both the sensitivity and the selectivity of the sensor, which can be thus considered as a new analytical tool for quick, simple, and accurate measurement of 4,4'-MDA during converting operations.

Keywords: 4,4′-methylene diphenyl diamine; Cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs); Electrochemical nanosensor; Food packaging; Gold nanoparticles; Screen-printed electrode.