A novel electrosynthesized polymer applied to molecular imprinting technology

Poly(2-macaptobenzimidazole) (PMBI) films are prepared at the gold electrode surface by electropolymerization using imprinting technology and the target analyte cholesterol is used as the template. A cholesterol-selective sensor based on PMBI film was employed in conjunction with differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) and ferricyanide as mediator. Concentration of cholesterol up to 100 μM could be detected with a linear determination range up to 20 μM and a detection limit of 0.7 μM. The molecular imprinting approach offers a relatively nice selectivity for the sensor toward cholesterol with respect to common coexisting substances. The method is simple and the stability of the electrode prepared is satisfactory. The results of this research show the feasibility of using molecular imprinting methodology for preparing sensing devices for analytes that are electrochemically inactive.