Excessive and indiscriminate use of the herbicide glyphosate (GLY) leaves the environment susceptible to its contamination. This work describes the development of a simple, inexpensive, and efficient electroanalytical method using graphite oxide paste electrode (GrO-PE) for the direct determination of GLY traces in groundwater samples, soybean extracts, and lettuce extracts. Under optimal experimental conditions, the developed sensor exhibited a linear response of the peak current intensity vs. the concentration, in the range of 1.8 × 10-5 to 1.2 × 10-3 mol L-1 for GLY. The limits of detection and quantification are 1.7 × 10-8 mol L-1 and 5.6 × 10-8 mol L-1, respectively. The methodology developed here demonstrated a strong analytical performance, with high reproducibility, repeatability, and precision. Moreover, it successfully avoided interference from other substances, showing high selectivity. The GrO-PE sensor was effectively applied to determine GLY traces in real samples with recovery rates ranging from 98% to 102%. Results showed that the GrO-PE is effective and useful for GLY detection, with the advantage of not involving laborious modifications and complicated handling, making it a promising tool for environmental analysis.
Keywords: Electrochemical sensor; Glyphosate determination; Groundwater samples; Soybean and lettuce extract; Voltammetry.
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