Bismuth film electrode for adsorptive stripping voltammetry -: electrochemical and microscopic study

The properties of the bismuth film electrode designed for adsorptive stripping voltammetry were examined by electrochemical and microscopic techniques. The various bismuth plating solutions containing bromide ions were tested in bismuth film generation on glassy carbon. The composition of the plating solution, the influence of accumulation potential, and the stability of bismuth coating as well as the memory effect is discussed. The analytical usefulness of the BiFEs obtained by the proposal procedure was estimated for adsorptive stripping measurement of cobalt traces in a solution of 1 x 10(-4) M DMG and 0.1 M ammonia buffer. It has been found that the plating solution of 0.02 M Bi(NO3)(3), 1 M HCl and 0.5 M LiBr as well as -0.28 V plating potential and 20 s plating time ensure the finest quality bismuth film deposited on the glassy carbon support for analytical purposes. The electrode-to-electrode reproducibility of the described plating procedure was characterized by the relative standard deviation (RSD) equal to 12%. The repeatability of the cobalt response for 30 subsequent adsorptive stripping measurements of the same BiFE amounted RSD = 6%. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.