Sensitive and selective electrochemical detection of artemisinin based on its reaction with p-aminophenylboronic acid

•Reaction of artemisinin with aromatic boronic acid has been first reported.•Reaction of artemisinin with p-aminophenylboronic acid generates aminophenol.•Artemisinin is detected by determining aminophenol with higher sensitivity.•The method is selective and can detect real samples.•The method may be extended to detect artemisinin derivatives.

The electrochemical detection of artemisinin generally requires high oxidation potential or the use of complex electrode modification. We find that artemisinin can react with p-aminophenylboronic acid to produce easily electrochemically detectable aminophenol for the first time. By making use of the new reaction, we report an alternative method to detect artemisinin through the determination of p-aminophenol. The calibration curve for the determination of artemisinin is linear in the range of 2 μmol L−1 to 200 μmol L−1 with the detection limit of 0.8 μmol L−1, which is more sensitive than other reported electrochemical methods. The relative standard deviation is 4.83% for the determination of 10 μM artemisinin. Because the oxidation potential of p-aminophenol is around 0 V, the present method is high selective. When 40 μM, 90 μM and 140 μM of artemisinin were spiked to compound naphthoquine phosphate tablet samples, the recoveries are 107.6%, 105.4% and 101.7%, respectively. This detection strategy is attractive for the detection of artemisinin and its derivatives. The finding that artemisinin can react with aromatic boronic acid has the potential to be exploited for the development of other sensors, such as fluorescence artemisinin sensors.

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