Preparation of a Hollow Nanocomposite with Gold-Embedded Zeolitic Imidazolate Framework-67 for the Electrochemical Determination of Dopamine

Graphical In a ZIF : A hollow nanocomposite is prepared, which shows an internal cavity and porous shell, making it a satisfactory electrochemical sensing material. This work employed a polystyrene sphere as a template to synthesize a hollow nanocomposite with gold-embedded zeolitic imidazolate framework-67 (H-Au@ZIF-67). The morphological and structural characteristics of the prepared composite were investigated by using scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and energy-disperse spectroscopy, indicating that H-Au@ZIF-67 with a sunflower-shaped cross section was successfully prepared. The synthesized H-Au@ZIF-67 was used to construct a dopamine electrochemical sensor, which showed good linearity scope of 0.25–438.75 μM with a high sensitivity of 332.1 μA mM −1 cm −2 and low detection limit of 0.04 μM. These results showed that the H-Au@ZIF-67 can be a good electrode modification material for dopamine sensing.