Smartphone-controlled Electrochemical Sensor for Copper Detection*

Abstract

this paper demonstrated a smartphone- controlled electrochemical sensor for copper ions (Cu2+) detection in waters. The electrochemical sensor is composed of a three-electrode-system and a detecting circuit module. The three-electrode-system is configured as an Au working- electrode, a Pt counter-electrode and an Ag/AgCl reference electrode. Configured under the square wave impulse voltammetry (SWV), the detecting circuit utilizes low-power consuming MCU to carry out constant potential control and weak current detection. Smartphone installed with the customized App can be used to control the operation of the sensor and implement data management in the detection process. The App was developed to realize the function of man-machine interaction and display testing curves of the electroanalytical measurements. Data exchange between the sensor and the smartphone is based on the Bluetooth protocol. A series of standard copper samples were tested to evaluate performance of the sensor, and the experimental results reveal that the sensor exhibits better sensitivity (4.064 μA/μgL-1) to Cu2+ than the original prototype from 0 μg/L to 1000 μg/L.