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Spectrophotometric determination of mercury(II) ions based on their stimulation effect on the peroxidase-like activity of molybdenum disulfide nanosheets

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Abstract

The authors describe a colorimetric method for the determination of Hg(II) ions by exploiting the peroxidase-lile activity of few-layered MoS2 nanosheets (MoS2-NSs). These were prepared by sonication-induced exfoliation of bulk MoS2 crystals in aqueous surfactant solution. The MoS2-NSs were found to acts as a peroxidase mimic that is capable of oxidizing the substrate 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) in the presence of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) to give a blue product with an absorption maximum at 652 nm. The addition of Hg(II) strongly accelerates the kinetics of this reaction. It is shown that the enzyme mimic possesses a high affinity for TMB and a lower pseudo-Michaelis-Menten constant. The stimulating effect of Hg(II) is seriously influenced by the change of surface charge. The use of nanosheets covered with (negatively charged) polystyrene sulfonate results in a decrease in the formation of blue dye, while those covered with (cationic) poly(diallyldimethyl ammonium) ions cause a small increase. Under optimal conditions, the peroxidase-like activity of MoS2-NSs is affected by Hg(II) in the 2.0 to 200 μM concentration range. The method has a detection limit (LOD) of 0.5 μM which is much below the allowed level in cosmetics (1 ppm; ca. 5 μM). The method display excellent sensitivity, selectivity and stability. It was applied to the determination of total mercury in cosmetic samples, and results compared well with results obtained by ICP-AES.

A spectrophotometric assay for mercury - (II) determination is reported that is based on Hg2+-stimulation effect on the 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB)-H2O2 reaction system catalyzed by MoS2 nanosheets.

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Acknowledgments

This work is supported by the Post-Doctoral Science Foundation of China (No. 2013 M542393), the Fundamental Research Fund for the Central Universities (No. lzujbky-2014-69) and Applied Basic Research Project of Qinghai Province (No.2015-ZJ-783).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry and State Key Laboratory of Applied organic Chemistry, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Yuan Lu, Jing Yu, Weichun Ye, Xin Yao, Panpan Zhou, Haixia Zhang & Lipei Jia

  2. College of Physics and Electronic Information Engineering, Qinhai University for Nationalities, Xining, 810007, China

    Suqin Zhao

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  1. Yuan Lu
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  2. Jing Yu
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  3. Weichun Ye
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Correspondence to Weichun Ye or Haixia Zhang.

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Lu, Y., Yu, J., Ye, W. et al. Spectrophotometric determination of mercury(II) ions based on their stimulation effect on the peroxidase-like activity of molybdenum disulfide nanosheets. Microchim Acta 183, 2481–2489 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-016-1886-4

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