An Overview on Electrochemical Sensors Based on Nanomaterials for the Determination of Drugs of Abuse

Abstract

: Drug abuse considered a serious source of economic and social problems. The sensing of drugs of abuse is of demanding in forensic and clinical toxicology. There are many various methods for determination these materials using chromatographic and mass spectrometric techniques. Most of these techniques needs high-cost equipment, time consuming and suffer hard sample preparations. However, electrochemical methods are easy, simple and no need for complicated sample preparations cause to more interests of their use for determinations of toxics and pharmaceuticals. On the other hand, use of nanomaterials in electrochemistry found wide attentions to improve selectivity, sensitivity and limit of detections of various compounds such as pharmaceuticals, biologicals and environmental. Nanomaterials draw interests due to their low cost and unique size-dependent properties. The settling of nanomaterials into different matrices to prepare nanocomposite films founds wide interest. The unique properties of nanomaterials like mechanical, electrical, optical, catalytic and magnetic properties in addition of their significant high surface area per mass make them popular. Besides the novel properties, nanomaterials demonstrate new approaches to fabricate low cost electrodes by minimizing the materials needed and waste. The presence of nanotechnology beside modern electrochemical techniques helps to emerge of powerful, reliable electrical devices for sensing that shows benefits like increasing mass transport rate, high surface area and good control over electrode microenvironment. The aim of this review is to give an outline for the electrochemical determination based on nanomaterials of the commonly occurring illicit drugs in a various matrices such as urine, blood and saliva, which are important for determining of drugs of abuse.

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Toxicologic Concerns with Current Medical Nanoparticles

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Recent Advances in the Development of Portable Electrochemical Sensors for Controlled Substances

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