Sensor Enhancement Using Nanomaterials to Detect Pharmaceutical Residue: Nanointegration Using Phenol as Environmental Pollutant

Phenol is an aromatic compound, with a wide variety of uses both medical and industrial. During its production, emissions of even low amounts have been demonstrated to be toxic at submicrogram/liter levels. Phenol is also a good model compound to assess environmental impact of its emission particularly in wastewater. However, the current approach, methodologies and application described herein can also be applied to other organic environmental / pharmaceutical pollutants. Phenol has been removed from wastewater through a number of different approaches and monitored using spectroscopy and chromatography. In the field the most common method is detection through electrochemical or colorimetric sensors, which are described in this study.