Abstract
Zn-Co-S ball-in-ball hollow sphere (BHS) was successfully prepared by solvothermal sulfurization method. An efficient strategy to synthesize Zn-Co-S BHS consisted of multilevel structures by controlling the ionic exchange reaction was applied to obtain great performance electrode material. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) as a conductive agent were uniformly introduced with Zn-Co-S BHS to form Zn-Co-S BHS/CNTs and expedited the considerable electrocatalytic behavior toward glucose electro-oxidation in alkaline medium. In this study, characterization with scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and X-ray diffraction (XRD) was used for investigating the morphological and physical/chemical properties and further evaluating the feasibility of Zn-Co-S BHS/CNTs in non-enzymatic glucose sensing. Electrochemical methods (cyclic voltammetry (CV) and chronoamperometry (CA)) were performed to investigate the glucose sensing performance of Zn-Co-S BHS/CNTs. The synergistic effect of Faradaic redox couple species of Zn-Co-S BHS and unique conductive network of CNTs exhibited excellent electrochemical catalytic ability towards the glucose electro-oxidation, which revealed linear range from 5 to 100 μM with high sensitivity of 2734.4 μA mM−1 cm−2, excellent detection limit of 2.98 μM, and great selectivity in the presence of dopamine, uric acid, ascorbic acid, and fructose. Thus, Zn-Co-S BHS/CNTs would be expected to be a promising material for non-enzymatic glucose sensing.
Highlights
According to the report of global diabetes estimates and projections in 2019 by the InternationalDiabetes Federation (IDF), 463 million people age 20–79 years had diabetes, and the number could increase to 700 million by 2045
scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images (Figure 1a,b) revealed that the Zn-Co-S ball hollow sphere (BHS) with an average size of about 500 nm exhibited a rough surface owing to its unique structural characterization, which endowed it with a large specific surface area
An individual Zn-Co-S BHS was displayed in the enlarged transmission electron microscopy (TEM) image (Figure 1c)
Summary
Diabetes Federation (IDF), 463 million people age 20–79 years had diabetes, and the number could increase to 700 million by 2045. The prevalence of diabetes in adults worldwide would increase from 9.3 to 10.9% by 2045 [1]. In Taiwan, diabetes is currently the fifth leading cause of death (data provided by Ministry of Health and Welfare, Taiwan) [2] and the observation shows that diabetes mortality will continue to increase over the coming decades due to unhealthy eating habits and physical inactivity. Type 2 diabetes is the predominant form of diabetes and accounts for 90% of patients diagnosed with diabetes [3]. The increase of type 2 diabetes may partly reflect increasing clinical diagnosis of diabetes and lead contributor to increasing diabetes prevalence. Exploring perspectives and practical strategies can be further provided to prevent or delay the prevalence of Sensors 2020, 20, 4340; doi:10.3390/s20154340 www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors
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