Fabrication of an electrochemical sensor based on computationally designed molecularly imprinted polymer for the determination of mesalamine in real samples.

A novel electrochemical sensor based on mesalamine molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) film on a glassy carbon electrode was fabricated. Density functional theory (DFT) in gas and solution phases was developed to study the intermolecular interactions in the pre-polymerization mixture and to find the suitable functional monomers in MIP preparation. On the basis of computational results, o-phenylenediamine (OP), gallic acid (GA) and p-aminobenzoic acid (ABA) were selected as functional monomers. The MIP film was cast on glassy carbon electrode by electropolymerization of solution containing ternary monomers and then followed by Ag dendrites (AgDs) with nanobranch deposition. The surface feature of the modified electrode (AgDs/MIP/GCE) was characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). Under the optimal experimental conditions, the peak current was proportional to the concentration of mesalamine ranging from 0.05 to 100 μM, with the detection limit of 0.015 μM. The proposed sensor was applied successfully for mesalamine determination in real samples.