Potentiometric stripping analysis of antimony based on carbon paste electrode modified with hexathia crown ether and rice husk

An electrochemical method based on potentiometric stripping analysis (PSA) employing a hexathia 18C6 (HT18C6) and rice husk (RH) modified carbon paste electrode (HT18C6–RH-CPE) has been proposed for the subnanomolar determination of antimony. The characterization of the electrode surface has been carried out by means of scanning electron microscopy, cyclic voltammetry, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and chronocoulometry. By employing HT18C6–RH-CPE, a 12-fold enhancement in the PSA signal (dt/dE) was observed as compared to plain carbon paste electrode (PCPE). Under the optimized conditions, dt/dE (s V−1) was proportional to the Sb(III) concentration in the range of 1.42 × 10−8 to 6.89 × 10−11 M (r = 0.9944) with the detection limit (S/N = 3) of 2.11 × 10−11 M. The practical analytical utilities of the modified electrode were demonstrated by the determination of antimony in pharmaceutical formulations, human hair, sea water, urine and blood serum samples. The prepared modified electrode showed several advantages, such as simple preparation method, high sensitivity, very low detection limit and excellent reproducibility. Moreover, the results obtained for antimony analysis in commercial and real samples using HT18C6–RH-CPE and those obtained by inductively coupled plasma-atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES) are in agreement at the 95% confidence level.

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► Potentiometric stripping analysis (PSA) employed for the determination of antimony.
► Hexathia-18C6 and rice husk modified carbon paste electrode developed for the analysis.
► Lowest detection limit obtained for the determination of Sb(III) using PSA.
► Analysis of Sb in pharmaceutical formulations, human hair, blood serum, urine and sea water.
► Rice husk used as a modifier for the first time in electrochemistry.