Carbon-coated copper nanocrystals with enhanced peroxidase-like activity for sensitive colorimetric determination of 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine

Carbon-coated copper nanocrystals (CuNCs) with peroxidase-like activity were hydrothermally prepared by using copper acetate, citric acid (CA) and histidine (His) as the precursors. Various shaped CuNCs, including urchin-like, slab-like and spherical appearance were facilely prepared by addition of different amount of NaNO 2 in the precursor solutions. When 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) was used as the substrate, the CuNCs with urchin-like appearance have greatest peroxidase-like activity and their Michaelis–Menten constant ( K m ) and the maximum rate constant (ν max ) are respectively 8.8 and 1.2 times higher than that obtained from horseradish peroxidase (HRP). The production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) was confirmed by radical quenching and electron spin resonance (ESR) tests. Subsequent studies have found that the CuNCs catalyzed color reaction of TMB can be selectively quenched by the environmental pollutant 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine (2,4-DNPH). Thus a new colorimetric method for the determination of 2,4-DNPH with a linear range of 0.60–20 µM was developed and a limit of detection (LOD) as low as 0.166 µM was achieved. The results obtained not only reveal the tunability of the peroxidase-like activity of Cu-based nanomaterials, but also provide a new method for the sensitive determination of environmental contaminate. Graphical abstract