A highly sensitive method for simultaneous determination of ultra trace levels of copper and cadmium in food and water samples with luminol as a chelating agent by adsorptive stripping voltammetry

► Luminol has different functional groups, so can be coordinated to of copper and cadmium. ► The procedure is based on reduction of complexes of those ions with luminol after accumulation at the surface of a HMDE. ► The adsorbed complexes of luminol-copper and cadmium produce two strong peaks at about −540 and −690 mV, respectively. ► These peaks can be used for simultaneous determination of copper and cadmium in real samples.