Amino-Functionalized Hierarchical Porous Carbon Derived from Zeolitic Imidazolate Frameworks for Ultrasensitive Electrochemical Sensing of Heavy Metals in Water

Abstract

Electrochemical sensing provides a feasible avenue to monitor heavy metal ions (HMIs) in water, whereas the construction of highly sensitive and selective sensors remains challenging. Herein, we fabricated a novel amino-functionalized hierarchical porous carbon by the template-engaged method using ZIF-8 as the precursor and polystyrene sphere as the template, followed by carbonization and controllable chemical grafting of amino groups for efficient electrochemical detection of HMIs in water. The amino-functionalized hierarchical porous carbon features an ultrathin carbon framework with a high graphitization degree, excellent conductivity, unique macro-, meso-, and microporous architecture, and rich amino groups. As a result, the sensor exhibits prominent electrochemical performance with significantly low limits of detection for individual HMIs (i.e., 0.93 nM for Pb2+, 2.9 nM for Cu2+, and 1.2 nM for Hg2+) and simultaneous detection of HMIs (i.e., 0.62 nM for Pb2+, 1.8 nM for Cu2+, and 0.85 nM for Hg2+), which are superior to most reported sensors in the literature. Moreover, the sensor displays excellent anti-interference ability, repeatability, and stability for HMI detection in actual water samples.