Development of a novel and potential chemical sensor for colorimetric detection of Pd(II) or Cu(II) in E-wastes

Abstract The current study created an optical, chemical sensor that uses a mesoporous silica surface for the colorimetric recognition and capture of Cu(II) and Pd(II) ions with great sensitivity. The optical nanosensor was fabricated by direct immobilization of a synthesized 2,2’-((1E,1’E)-((6-hydroxy-2-mercaptopyrimidine-4,5-diyl) bis(azaneylylidene))bis(methaneylylidene)) bis(4-bromophenol) (HMPAMB) chromophore onto the porous of mesoporous silica nanoparticeles carriers. The HMPAMB sensor was characterized by XRD, TEM, SEM-EDX, and BET. The fabricated chemical sensor has the ability to sense Cu(II) and Pd(II) ions colorimetry with detection limits of 0.34, and 0.28 ppb, respectively, in quick, straightforward steps with high sensitivity. Three isotherm models were used to study the mechanism of Cu(II) and Pd(II) adsorption on the surface of HMPAMB. The results show that the modeling isotherm followed the Langmuir isotherm. The sensing efficiency of the HMPAMB sensor within the recycle numbers was calculated by three replicates (n = 3). Our outcomes reveal that the developed HMPAMB sensor offers an effective and reliable colorimetric procedure for detecting and extracting the target ions from E-wastes.