Sensitive determination of epinephrine in pharmaceutical preparation by flow injection coupled with chemiluminescence detection and mechanism study

Ferrocene/ β-cyclodextrin based supramolecular nanogels as theranostic systems

A supramolecular redox responsive nanogel (NG) with the ability to sense cancer cells and loaded with a releasing therapeutic agent was synthesized using hostguest interactions between polyethylene glycol-grafted-β-cyclodextrin and ferrocene boronic acid. Cyclic voltammetry matched with other spectroscopy and microscopy methods provided strong indications regarding host-guest interactions and formation of the NG. Moreover, the biological properties of the NG were evaluated using fluorescence silencing, confocal laser scanning microscopy, and cell toxicity assays. Nanogel with spherical core-shell architecture and 100-200 nm sized nanoparticles showed high encapsulation efficiency for doxorubicin (DOX) and luminol (LU) as therapeutic and sensing agents. High therapeutic and sensing efficiencies were manifested by complete release of DOX and dramatic quenching of LU fluorescence triggered by 0.05 mM H2O2 (as an ROS component). The NGs showed high ROS sensitivity. Taking advantage of a high loading capacity, redox sensitivity, and biocompatibility, the NGs can be used as strong theranostic systems in inflammation-associated diseases.

Determination of Exogenous Adrenaline Levels in Patients Undergoing Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation

Core-shell quantum dot ZnS/CdSe screen-printed electrodes were used to electrochemically measure human blood plasma levels of exogenous adrenaline administered to cardiac arrest patients. The electrochemical behavior of adrenaline on the modified electrode surface was investigated using differential pulse voltammetry (DPV), cyclic voltammetry, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). Under optimal conditions, the linear working ranges of the modified electrode were 0.001-3 μM (DPV) and 0.001-300 μM (EIS). The best limit of detection for this concentration range was 2.79 × 10^-8 μM (DPV). The modified electrodes showed good reproducibility, stability, and sensitivity and successfully detected adrenaline levels.

Thermoelectric, Electrochemical, & Dielectric Properties of Four ZnO Nanostructures

In this work, we investigated the thermoelectric, electrochemical, and dielectric properties of four different ZnO morphologies, namely nanoribbons, nanorods, nanoparticles, and nanoshuttles. Temperature-dependent Seebeck coefficients were observed using thermoelectric measurements, which confirmed that all synthesized ZnO nanostructures are n-type semiconductors. The Van der Pauw method was applied to measure electrical conductivity, which was also used to calculate the thermal activation energy. Electrochemical properties were analyzed by cyclic voltammetry techniques under five different optical filters. Electrical conductivity of ZnO morphologies showed an increasing trend with increasing temperature. The highest electrical conductivity (1097.60 Ω−1 m−1) and electronic thermal conductivity (1.16×10−4 W/mK) were obtained for ZnO nanorods at 425 K, whereas ZnO nanoshuttles carried the lowest electrical conductivity (1.10 × 10−4 Ω−1 m−1) and electronic thermal conductivity (8.72 × 10−7 W/mK) at 325 K. ZnO nanorods obtained the maximum Power factor value in all temperature ranges. All nanostructures showed electro-catalytic performance with different optical filters. From impedance spectroscopy analysis, ZnO nanorods showed the highest dielectric constant at high frequencies (>1 MHz) at 2.02 ± 0.06, while ZnO nanoshuttles gave the highest dielectric constant at low frequencies (<100 Hz) at 9.69 ± 0.05. These results indicate that ZnO nanorods have the most favorable thermoelectric, electrochemical, and dielectric properties compared to all other ZnO morphologies.

Selective determination of epinephrine using electrochemical sensor based on ordered mesoporous carbon / nickel oxide nanocomposite

A nanocomposite of ordered mesoporous carbon/nickel oxide (OMC-NiO) was synthesized by hard-templating method. The nanocomposite remained ordered mesostructure and high surface area with the NiO nanocrystals embedded in the wall of the OMC. A sensitive sensor for electrochemical detection of epinephrine (EP) was developed with GCE modified by OMC-NiO nanocomposite. Cyclic voltammogram (CV) and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) were used as the techniques to explore the electrochemical behavior of EP on OMC-NiO/GCE surface. The result showed that the electrode demonstrated better electrocatalytic performance to EP compared to that seen at OMC/GCE. Under the optimum condition, DPV measurements of the electrode response displayed a linear detection range for 8.0 × 10^-7 to 5.0 × 10^-5 M with a detection limit of 8.5 × 10^-8 M (S/N = 3). It is worth noting that the electrocatalytic redox mechanism of EP on the electrode have studied through experiments and calculations (cyclic voltammetry and molecular electrostatic potential distribution). Moreover, the electrocatalytic behavior for the oxidation of EP and uric acid (UA) on OMC-NiO/GCE surface was investigated. The result showed that the sensor can be used to selectively determinate EP in the presence of an excesses of UA. Finally, the developed sensor was successfully applied to the determination of EP in spiked human blood serum and EP injection with satisfactory results.

Flow analysis with chemiluminescence detection: Recent advances and applications

This article highlights the most important developments in flow analysis with chemiluminescence (CL) detection, describing different flow systems that are compatible with CL detection, detector designs, commonly applied CL reactions and approaches to sample treatment. Recent applications of flow analysis with CL detection (focusing on outputs published since 2010) are also presented. Applications are classified by sample matrix, covering foods and beverages, environmental matrices, pharmaceuticals and biological fluids. Comprehensive tables are provided for each area, listing the specific sample matrix, CL reaction used, linear range, limit of detection and sample treatment for each analyte. Finally, recent and emerging trends in the field are also discussed.

Highly sensitive trivalent copper chelate-luminol chemiluminescence system for capillary electrophoresis detection of epinephrine in the urine of smoker

Epinephrine (EP) is one of the most important neurotransmitters and hormones. Some previous literatures show that there is a close relation between its release and smoking. To compare the levels of EP in urines of smokers and nonsmokers, a sensitive chemiluminescence (CL) system, luminol-diperiodatocuprate (III) (K(5)[Cu(HIO(6))(2)], DPC), has been developed and validated for the determination of EP after CE separation. The DPC-luminol-EP CL reaction showed very intensive emission and fast kinetic characteristics, thus led to a high sensitivity in the flow-through detection mode for capillary electrophoresis. With the peak height as a quantitative parameter, the relative CL intensity was linear with the EP concentration in the range of 2.0-400ng/mL, with a limit of detection of 0.82ng/mL (S/N=3). The reproducibility was assessed by intra- and inter-day relative standard deviations (RSDs) for 11 replicate determinations of EP standard samples at low, medium and high concentrations. The intra- and inter-day RSDs for CL signals were 5.5%-6.6% and 6.1%-7.5%, respectively, and those for migration times were 3.4%-5.8% and 4.3%-6.3%, respectively. The presented method was successfully applied to the determination of EP in EP injection and urine samples of smokers and nonsmokers. The recovery test results for urine samples ranged from 86.5 to 112.0%, which demonstrated the reliability of this method. The results for urine sample detection indicate that the average level of EP in the urines of the smoker group is obviously higher than that in the urines of the nonsmoker group, which may demonstrate that smoking can stimulate the release of EP in human body.