Recent advances in electrochemical detection of important sulfhydryl-containing compounds

Monitoring of important sulfhydryl-containing compounds has risen to importance as their crucial functions in different tissues have been reported. While hydrogen sulfide is the most recent endogenous gasotransmitter in human tissues, low-molecular weight endogenous thiols cysteine, glutathione, and homocysteine are biomarkers for numerous clinical conditions. As the result of environmental, biochemical, clinical, and pharmacological importance of the sulfhydryl compounds, an accurate determination has gained significant attention within the analytical community. In the recent half-decade, many new approaches of sulfhydryl determination have been reported; majority of them consists in new working electrode system fabrication. Electrochemical detection offers simple, inexpensive, rapid, and highly sensitive analytical methods. The review summarizes up-to-date approaches in research on the electrochemical detection of sulfhydryl-containing compounds reported in the recent half-decade. In this field, a significant trend of using nanocomposite materials with suitable electron transfer mediator is evident.