Inhibitive determination of metal ions by an amperometric glucose oxidase biosensor: Study of the effect of hydrogen peroxide decomposition

An amperometric glucose biosensor based on glucose oxidase immobilized in electrosynthesized poly-o-phenylenediamine was successfully applied to the determination of a wide group of heavy metals of environmental interest. The inhibition effects of Hg2+, Ag+, Cu2+, Cd2+, Pb2+, Cr3+, Fe3+, Co2+, Ni2+, Zn2+, Mn2+ and also CrO42− on glucose oxidase were studied. Collected data showed a reversible inhibition mechanism. Results about the quantitative analysis of metal ions in terms of detection limit, linear range, sensitivity and R.S.D. are discussed for each tested metal ion. The biosensor was able to discriminate two different oxidation states of chromium being able to reject Cr3+ and to detect the toxic species CrO42−. Also biosensor storage stability and response reproducibility were investigated.Moreover, this study represents the first attempt of evaluating the effect of the hydrogen peroxide decomposition by metal ions on the response of an enzymatic biosensor based on the amperometric detection of the hydrogen peroxide. Experiments were performed with the aim to quantitatively evaluate, for any single metal ion, if this process is competitive with the inhibition of enzymatic reaction in the adopted experimental conditions.