An overview of recent developments of carbon-based sensors for the analysis of drug molecules

This review summarizes some recent developments in the fabrication of modified sensors and biosensors using carbon-based materials. The great potential of carbon-based electrodes as sensing platforms is exciting due to their unique electrical and chemical properties, high accessibility and high biocompatibility. Carbon-based materials are particularly interesting due to almost infinite possibility of their functionalization with a wide variety of organic molecules, biologically important compounds and pharmaceuticals. This review is specifically focused on recent developments in the utilization of various carbon-based electrodes in sensing devices for the electrochemical investigation of drug molecules. Various voltammetric techniques considered in this effort include linear sweep voltammetry (LSV), cyclic voltammetry (CV), differential pulse voltammetry (DPV), square wave voltammetry (SWV), and square wave adsorptive stripping voltammetry (SWAdSV). The carbon-based electrode materials considered in this review comprise carbon paste, carbon nanotubes, graphite, graphene, and glassy carbon. The analytes chosen are some routinely used drugs such as paracetamol (PC), diclofenac sodium (DCF), 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), cetirizine (CTZ) and salbutamol (SAL). All here reported sensing electrodes produced very good results in electrochemical investigations of these drug molecules.