Hydrothermal Synthesis of MnO[sub.2]/Reduced Graphene Oxide Composite for 4-Nitrophenol Sensing Applications

Recently, the electrochemical sensing approach has attracted materials/electrochemical scientists to design and develop electrode materials for the construction of electrochemical sensors for the detection of para-nitrophenol (4-NP). In the present study, we have prepared a hybrid composite of MnO[sub.2] and rGO (MnO[sub.2] /rGO) using a hydrothermal approach. The morphological features of the prepared MnO[sub.2] /rGO composite were studied by scanning electron microscopy, whereas the phase purity and formation of the MnO[sub.2] /rGO composite were authenticated via the powder X-ray diffraction method. Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy was also employed to analyze the elemental composition of the prepared MnO[sub.2] /rGO composite. In further studies, a glassy carbon electrode (GCE) was modified with MnO[sub.2] /rGO composite (MnO[sub.2] /rGO/GCE) and explored as 4-nitrophenol (4-NP) sensor. The fabricated MnO[sub.2] /rGO/GCE exhibited a reasonably good limit of detection of 0.09 µM with a sensitivity of 0.657 µA/µMcm[sup.2] . The MnO[sub.2] /rGO/GCE also demonstrates good selectivity, stability and repeatability in 50 cycles.