Ruthenium(III) diphenyldithiocarbamate as mediator for the electrocatalytic oxidation of sulfhydryl compounds at graphite electrode

Ruthenium(In) diphenyldithiocarbamate was used as mediator to modify graphite electrode by abrasive method. The modified electrode was characterized electrochemically by cyclic voltammetry. The electrode was scanned between 0.0 V to +0.8 V, An anodic peak at + 0.39 V and a cathodic peak at +0.24 V have been observed for a scan rate of 100 mV/s. The electrode has been characterized at various scan rate and pHs in 0.1 M KNO3 solution. Sulfhydryl compounds, cysteine and glutathione, were electrocatalytically oxidised at the modified electrode. pH variation was studied to optimize the conditions for their estimation. Linear response for cysteine is in the range of 0.00-15.20 ppm, with a correlation coefficient (r), of 0.9993. The linear range for glutathione is 0.00-30.40 ppm, with a value of 0.999 for r. The electrocatalytic oxidation of both cysteine and glutathione gave reproducible current values with a standard deviation of 0.1686 for 10 repetitive determinations. The stability and reproducibility of the;electrode for the determination of cysteine and glutathione were also discussed. The electrocatalytic oxidation of the sulfhydryl compounds were also studied in hydrodynamic environment.