Electrochemical Behaviors of Hydroquinone on a Carbon Paste Electrode with Ionic Liquid as Binder

In this paper the electrochemical behaviors of hydroquinone ($H_2Q$) were investigated on a carbon paste electrode using room temperature ionic liquid N-butylpyridinium hexafluorophosphate ($BPPF_6$) as binder (ILCPE) and further applied to $H_2Q$ determination. In pH 2.5 phosphate buffer solution (PBS), the electrochemical response of H2Q was greatly improved on the IL-CPE with a pair of well-defined quasi-reversible redox peaks appeared, which was attributed to the electrocatalytic activity of IL-CPE to the $H_2Q$. The redox peak potentials were located at 0.340 V (Epa) and 0.240 V (Epc) (vs. the saturated calomel electrode, SCE), respectively. The formal potential ($E^0$') was calculated as 0.290 V and the peak-to-peak separation (${\Delta}E_p$) was 0.100 V. The electrochemical parameters of $H_2Q$ on the IL-CPE were further calculated by cyclic voltammetry. Under the selected conditions the anodic peak current was linear with $H_2Q$ concentration over the range from $5.0\;{{\times}}\;10^{-6}$ to $5.0\;{\times}\;10^{-3}\;mol\;L^{-1}$ with the detection limit as $2.5\;{\times}\;10^{-6}\;mol\;L^{-1}$ (3$\sigma$ ) by cyclic voltammetry. The proposed method was successful applied to determination of $H_2Q$ content in a synthetic wastewater sample without the interferences of commonly coexisting substances.