Towards disposable sensors for drug quality control: Dextromethorphan screen- printed electrodes

A simple, rapid, reliable, and reproducible method for mass production of disposable sensors using screen‐printing technology is described. Homemade printing has been characterized and optimized on the basis of effects of the modifier and plasticizers. The fabricated bi‐electrode potentiometric strip containing both working and reference electrode was used as dextromethorphan (DXM) sensor. The proposed sensors worked satisfactorily in the concentration range from 10−5 to 10−2 mol L−1 with detection limit reaching 6 × 10−6 mol L−1 and adequate shelf life of 8 months. DXM was determined in pharmaceutical formulations under batch and flow injection analysis (FIA) conditions with sampling output 120 h−1. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. A simple, rapid, reliable and reproducible method for mass production of disposable sensors using screen‐printing technology is described. The fabricated bi‐electrode potentiometric strip containing both working and reference electrode was used as dextromethorphan (DXM) sensor. The proposed sensors worked satisfactorily in the concentration range from 10−5 to 10−2 mol L−1 with detection limit reaching 6 × 10−6 mol L−1 and adequate shelf lifetime of 8 months. DXM was determined in pharmaceutical formulations under batch and flow injection analysis (FIA) conditions with sampling output 120 h−1.