Elucidating mechanisms and DFT analysis of monometallic Vanadium incorporated nanoporous TiO2 as advanced material for enzyme-free electrochemical blood glucose biosensors with exceptional performance tailored for point-of-care applications

Abstract

Diabetes is a chronic condition that can last a lifetime and has claimed a great number of lives in recent years. This motivated scientists to design a glucose biosensor to monitor and control blood glucose levels in diabetic patients. Herein, hydrothermal derived Vanadium (V), Nickel (Ni), and Cobalt (Co)-dopedTiO2 (MxTi1-xO2 (x = 0.01, 0.02, and 0.03)) was synthesized to achieve the best material to answer the pertaining problem. Of all the materials synthesized, V0.03Ti0.97O2@NF demonstrated the highest level of sensitivity, and selectivity, and has higher electrochemical cycling stability in 0.1 M KOH. It exhibits a very high sensitivity of 1129.31 μAmM-1cm-2 and Limits of Detection (LOD) and Limits of Quantification (LOQ) of 1.8 μM (S/N = 3) and 6.2 μM, respectively, with a broad linear range from 20 μM to 2 mM. The DFT approach was employed computationally to analyze the adsorption of glucose on surfaces of pure TiO2 and TiO2 doped with V, Ni, and Co respectively. The research findings highlight that when it comes to its interaction with glucose, pure TiO2 exhibits significantly less reactivity compared to transition metal-doped TiO2. Experimentally it shows thattheV0.03Ti0.97O2@NF surface has the most sensitiveglucose detection capability and it alsoexhibited significant selectivity towards glucose in the presence of additional interference. Itdemonstrated 100% retention after cycling stability and had a shelf life of ≃30 days. The V0.03Ti0.97O2@NF-based sensor exhibits accurate glucose sensing, even for human serum samples.