Electrochemical mediated preparation of chelating polymer brushes at paraffin-impregnated graphite electrode for Pb2+ sensing

•Chelating polymer could be used to heavy metal sensing.•Formation of chelating polymer in situ is convenient by electrochemical method for heavy metal sensing.•Two-dimension chelating polymer with more functional groups and space, which probably are beneficial to mass transfer.•Iminodiacetic acid functional glycidyl methacrylate polymer brushes was prepared by electrochemical mediated atom transfer radical polymerization.

In this work, two-dimension iminodiacetic acid functional gclycidyl methacrylate polymer brushes were prepared at paraffin-impregnated electrode for Pb2+ sensing. Gclycidyl methacrylate polymer brushes were prepared using electrochemical mediated atom transfer radical polymerization, ring-opening reaction of the epoxy groups was enforced using iminodiacetic acid to form chelating polymer brushes (IGMA/WGE). The electrode was carefully examined by fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, field emission scanning electronmicroscope and electrochemistry techniques. Abundant chelating polymer brushes evenly coated at WGE with an average size of 0.1 × 2 μm. Further IGMA/WGE was successfully used for the determination of Pb2+ by differential pulse adsorptive anodic stripping voltammetry. The current responses (-0.58 V) were linearly increased depending on the concentration from 3 to 90 nM (i(μA) = -1.12 + 0.82 c (nM), limit 0.79 nM, 3σ). The present electrode is potentially useful for real sample analysis.

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