Fabrication of magnetic porous pseudo-carbon paste electrode electrochemical biosensor and its application in detection of schistosoma egg antigen

A novel and sensitive electrochemical sensor based on magnetic porous pseudo-carbon paste electrode (MPPCPE) for schistosoma egg antigen (SEA) detection is described. MPPCPE was fabricated by mixing polymethyl methacrylate microspheres (PMMA) as the template, magnetic powder and graphite powders as the fillers, and pyrrole as the precursor of polymer which actually acted as the paste. After the polymerization of pyrrole catalyzed by Fe3+, the template PMMA microspheres were removed with toluene to form MPPCPE. The SEA on the electrode was monitored by anodic stripping voltammetry (ASV) analysis using the method of gold nanoparticle-catalyzed silver enhancement. Compared with previous magnetic carbon paste electrode (MCPE), the detection sensitivity was dramatically increased. A linear relationship between the anodic stripping peak current and the concentration of SEA from 0.02 to 1 μg/mL and a limit of detection as low as 0.01 μg/mL were obtained using MPPCPE.