New carbon black-based conductive filaments for the additive manufacture of improved electrochemical sensors by fused deposition modeling

The development of a homemade carbon black composite filament with polylactic acid (CB-PLA) is reported. Optimized filaments containing 28.5% wt. of carbon black were obtained and employed in the 3D printing of improved electrochemical sensors by fused deposition modeling (FDM) technique. The fabricated filaments were used to construct a simple electrochemical system, which was explored for detecting catechol and hydroquinone in water samples and detecting hydrogen peroxide in milk. The determination of catechol and hydroquinone was successfully performed by differential pulse voltammetry, presenting LOD values of 0.02 and 0.22 µmol L(−1), respectively, and recovery values ranging from 91.1 to 112% in tap water. Furthermore, the modification of CB-PLA electrodes with Prussian blue allowed the non-enzymatic amperometric detection of hydrogen peroxide at 0.0 V (vs. carbon black reference electrode) in milk samples, with a linear range between 5.0 and 350.0 mol L(−1) and low limit of detection (1.03 µmol L(−1)). Thus, CB-PLA can be successfully applied as additively manufactured electrochemical sensors, and the easy filament manufacturing process allows for its exploration in a diversity of applications. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT: [Image: see text] SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00604-022-05511-2.