*Article*

#### **The Scavenging Effect of Myoglobin from Meat Extracts toward Peroxynitrite Studied with a Flow Injection System Based on Electrochemical Reduction over a Screen-Printed Carbon Electrode Modified with Cobalt Phthalocyanine: Quantification and Kinetics †**

**Ioana Silvia Hosu 1,\*, Diana Constantinescu-Aruxandei 1, Florin Oancea 1 and Mihaela Doni 2,\***

	- 2Biotechnology and Bioanalysis Department, National Institute for Research & Development in Chemistry and Petrochemistry—ICECHIM, 202 Spl. Independentei, Sector 6, 060021 Bucharest, Romania

**Abstract:** The scavenging activity of myoglobin toward peroxynitrite (PON) was studied in meat extracts, using a new developed electrochemical method (based on cobalt phthalocyanine-modified screen-printed carbon electrode, SPCE/CoPc) and calculating kinetic parameters of PON decay (such as half-time and apparent rate constants). As reactive oxygen/nitrogen species (ROS/RNS) affect the food quality, the consumers can be negatively influenced. The discoloration, rancidity, and flavor of meat are altered in the presence of these species, such as PON. Our new highly thermically stable, cost-effective, rapid, and simple electrocatalytical method was combined with a flow injection analysis system to achieve high sensitivity (10.843 nA μM−1) at a nanomolar level LoD (400 nM), within a linear range of 3–180 μM. The proposed biosensor was fully characterized using SEM, FTIR, Raman spectroscopy, Cyclic Voltammetry (CV), Differential Pulse Voltammetry (DPV), and Linear Sweep Voltammetry (LSV). These achievements were obtained due to the CoPc-mediated reduction of PON at very low potentials (around 0.1 V vs. Ag/AgCl pseudoreference). We also proposed a redox mechanism involving two electrons in the reduction of peroxynitrite to nitrite and studied some important interfering species (nitrite, nitrate, hydrogen peroxide, dopamine, ascorbic acid), which showed that our method is highly selective. These features make our work relevant, as it could be further applied to study the kinetics of important oxidative processes in vivo or in vitro, as PON is usually present in the nanomolar or micromolar range in physiological conditions, and our method is sensitive enough to be applied.

**Keywords:** electrocatalysis; peroxynitrite; flow injection analysis; meat extracts; myoglobin; cobalt phthalocyanine; electrochemical reduction; screen-printed carbon electrode; amperometric detection; decay kinetics
