Ibuprofen is the third most popular drug in the world, and its presence in wastewater nowadays is regarded as an environmental pollutant which requires viable methods for its determination [1]. The use of electrochemical techniques offers for many great advantages such as simplicity, high sensitivity, rapidity, accuracy and precision of analytical information, as well as low cost of analysis. In the present research, a conducting polypyrrole (ppy) matrix doped with the anionic sulfated β-cyclodextrin (sβ-CD) was electrosynthesized and used as a potentiometric sensor for the detection of ibuprofen. The sβ-CD was permanently immobilized within the ppy backbone during the growth of the polymer. The incorporation of the macrocycle was deposited at the surface of glassy carbon electrodes by means of cyclic voltammetry (CV). The effect of polymerization condition on the characteristics of potential response of the sensor was investigated. The concentration of pyrrole and sβ-CD, the electrode type, the number of voltammetric cycles, were optimized. Under the optimized conditions, the proposed sensor works satisfactory in the concentration range of 10-5 to 10-1 mol L-1 of ibuprofen (as its anionic conjugated base) with a quasi Nernstian slope (~ 50 mV decade-1 activity) and a fast response time of 20 s. Selectivity of the sensor over diverse non-steroidal analgesic drugs and inorganic salts were evaluated. The developed sensor has been applied for the potentiometric determination of ibuprofen in wastewater and pharmaceutical formulation samples.

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