The ethylene glycol template assisted hydrothermal synthesis of Co3O4 nanowires; structural characterization and their application as glucose non-enzymatic sensor

In the work reported herein the ethylene glycol template assisted hydrothermal synthesis, onto Au substrate, of thin and highly dense cobalt oxide (Co3O4) nanowires and their characterization and their application for non-enzymatic glucose sensing are reported. The structure and composition of Co3O4 nanowires have been fully characterized using scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, high resolution transmission electron microscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The synthesized Co3O4 nanowires resulted to have high purity and showed diameter of approximately 10 nm. The prepared Co3O4 nanowires coated gold electrodes were applied to the non-enzymatic detection of glucose. The developed sensor showed high sensitivity (4.58 × 101 μA mM−1 cm−2), a wide linear range of concentration (1.00 × 10−4–1.2 × 101 mM) and a detection limit of 2.65 × 10−5 mM. The developed glucose sensor has also shown to be very stable and selective over interferents such as uric acid and ascorbic acid. Furthermore, the proposed fabrication process was shown to be highly reproducible response (over nine electrodes).