Electrochemical reduction of neonicotinoids insecticides catalysed by metallic silver: case of the detection of imidacloprid in tomato and orange juices

The purpose of this paper is the electrochemical determination of imidacloprid using square wave voltammetry (SWV). The metallic silver electrode (MSE) was used to catalyse the reduction of imidacloprid (Imd) in Britton-Robinson (B-R- buffer (pH 11.6)). This investigation is honoured by calculating the electro-active surface coverage (Г), the transfer coefficient, (α), the catalytic rate constant and the diffusion coefficient (D). These parameters guided us to deduce that the reduction of imidacloprid is controlled by a mixed process of adsorption and diffusion. On the other hand, under the selected conditions, the cathodic current of imidacloprid was linearly related from 1.0 × 10−5 mol L−1 to 1.0 × 10−3 mol L−1 with a correlation coefficient of 0.9936. The detection limit and quantification limit were 6.9 × 10−6 mol L−1 and 2.3 × 10−5 mol L−1, respectively. Furthermore, metallic silver electrode was applied to the determination of imidacloprid in tomato and orange samples.