Development of electrochemical sensor based on layered double hydroxide as a marker of environmental toxin

Zinc/vanadium layered double hydroxide (LDH) was prepared and its functional relationships with thiourea were investigated in order to develop a sensor for the recognition of this toxin. Sensor technology is one of the major recognition methods and has shown potential applications in environmental monitoring, but issues of sensitivity, selectivity, and high cost related to this technology still need to be resolved in order to allow their more extensive use. Our study therefore focused on the development of a low-cost selective and sensitive thiourea sensor. This was developed using LDH where its sensing potential was investigated by a simple I–V technique. The developed sensor exhibited high sensitivity (1.004 μA μM cm−2), lower limit of detection (8.4 μM) and wide range of linear dynamics (10–500 μM). The selectivity was studied using different interfering agents and it was found that the developed sensor is more selective toward thiourea. The sensor behavior was further optimized using buffers of different pH.