Internal solid contact sensor for the determination of doxycycline hydrochloride in pharmaceutical formulation

The internal solid contact sensor for the determination of doxycycline hydrochloride (DC) was developed based on a conducting polypyrrole (PPy) film immobilized on a glassy carbon electrode surface casted by a plasticized polyvinyl chloride (PVC) membrane containing an ion-pair compound of DC with tetraphenylborate (TPB) and dibutylphthalate (DBP) as plasticizer. Effects of various factors for the electropolymerization of pyrrole or aniline, including monomer concentration, acidity or inorganic salt and thickness of polymer film were investigated experimentally. It was found that the slope and the linear range of SCSs changed with both the different concentration of monomer and of KCl in electrolyte solution and with the different substrate material and a marked influence of the change of solution pH on the potential response of sensor occurred when sample solution pH>3.5. Under the condition of pH 2.8, the sensor showed a near-Nernstian response over the range of DC concentration of 1.0×10−2–1.0×10−5 mol l−1 with the slope (at 25 °C) of 54.4 mV per decade. The detection limit obtained was 4.0×10−6 mol l−1.The sensor was successfully applied to determination of DC in pharmaceutical formulation.