Nitrogen-doped carbon quantum dots embedded Co3O4 with multiwall carbon nanotubes: An efficient probe for the simultaneous determination of anticancer and antibiotic drugs

Abstract

The simultaneous determination of anticancer and antibiotic drugs in biological samples with fast and sensitive methods is an essential task for the effective monitoring of drug therapy. A novel electrochemical sensor for the simultaneous determination of anticancer drug Flutamide (FLU) and antibiotic drug Nitrofurantoin (NF) was developed based on the glassy carbon electrode (GCE) modified with N-CQD@Co₃O₄/MWCNTs hybrid nanocomposite. The electro-kinetics of the developed sensor was studied using cyclic voltammetry (CV). The electrochemical performance of FLU and NF on the N-CQD@Co₃O₄/MWCNTs/GCE surface was examined using CV and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) techniques. At an optimized condition, the developed sensor exhibits excellent performance in simultaneous determination of FLU and NF with a linear range of 0.05-590 μM and 0.05-1220 μM and detection limit of 0.0169 μM and 0.044 μM respectively. Furthermore, the developed sensor exhibits satisfactory results in the real sample analysis.

Keywords: Antibiotic drug; Anticancer drug; Carbon quantum dot; Co(3)O(4); Simultaneous determination.