Applied Surface Science 408 (2017) 96–102

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Applied Surface Science

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Full Length Article

Amperometric glucose sensor based on the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 −

electrode obtained from a thin Ni3 Al foil
Magdalena Jarosz a,∗ , Robert P. Socha b , Paweł Jóźwik c , Grzegorz D. Sulka a
a
Department of Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry, Faculty of Chemistry, Jagiellonian University, Ingardena 3, 30060 Krakow, Poland
b
Jerzy Haber Institute of Catalysis and Surface Chemistry Polish Academy of Sciences, Niezapominajek 8, 30239 Krakow, Poland
c
Faculty of Advanced Technology and Chemistry, Military University of Technology, Kaliskiego 2, 00908 Warsaw, Poland

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this report, we present a facile and relatively fast method to roughen the surface of Ni3 Al–based inter-
Received 7 December 2016 metallic foil, and test it as an amperometric non-enzymatic glucose sensor. The alloy samples underwent
Received in revised form 8 February 2017 chemical etching in a H3 PO4 :CH3 COOH (HAc):HNO3 :H2 O (24:1:1:7 in volume) solution in order to achieve
Accepted 20 February 2017
a high surface area with more electroactive sites. The Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode was fabricated using
Available online 22 February 2017
potential cycling technique in a highly concentrated alkaline solution. The electrodes were tested elec-
trochemically for oxidation of glucose. We have demonstrated that Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrodes exhibit
Keywords:
high sensitivity towards glucose detection (796 ␮AmM-1 cm-2 ) and short response time (3 s) upon suc-
Ni3 Al alloy
Chemical etching
cessive addition of glucose. Moreover, as for a non-nanometric material, prepared electrodes show a
Amperometric sensor relatively good linear correlation between current density and glucose concentration (0.025–0.45 mM)
Glucose sensor and limit of detection (47.6 ␮M). For more in-depth characterization of presented material, electrodes
were examined using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS),
X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS).
© 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Nowadays, one of the most common and problematic diseases
affecting hundreds of millions of people is a diabetic mellitus [1].
Therefore, many studies have been focused on the fabrication of
fast responding and highly sensitive glucose sensors, not only for
medical applications but also for biotechnology and food industry
[2,3]. Currently, two different types of electrochemical glucose sen-
sors are developed, namely, enzymatic [4] and nonenzymatic [5,6].
Former are based on the various types of materials to which glu-
cose oxidase (GOx ) is immobilized [7]. Such sensors possess very
high sensitivity and selectivity, and low detection limit. However,
enzyme-immobilized electrodes are extremely sensitive towards
thermal and chemical conditions, such as pH, humidity, and tem-
perature [8,9], which make them impossible to apply commercially.
Due to the aforementioned drawbacks, extensive efforts have been
made in order to find an enzyme-free glucose sensor. The main
idea for such sensor, was to fabricate an electrode from electroac-
tive material that would have an ability to oxidize glucose directly
on the electrode surface [6,10]. As an electroactive material, various
∗ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: jarosz@chemia.uj.edu.pl (M. Jarosz).
types of metals (e.g., Pt, Au, Ni, Cu) and binary alloys (e.g., Ni-Cu,
Pt-Pb, Ni-Al, Ni-Pd) [5,11–15], as well as transition metal oxides
and hydroxides (e.g., NiO, Ni(OH)2 , Cu(OH)2 ) [16–18] have been
tested. In particular, Ni-based materials, due to a very high elec-
trocatalytic activity towards glucose oxidation and relatively low
production costs, have been extensively exploited.
The mechanism of glucose oxidation on Ni was first reported
by Fleischmann et al. in 1971 [19]. It is based on Ni2+ /Ni3+ redox
couple in an alkaline solution. Up to now, different forms of Ni com-
pounds in a form of nanowires, nanoparticles, and microspheres
were used for glucose oxidation [20–22]. Some of those materials
were also attached to carbon-based nanomaterials, namely carbon
nanotubes (CNTs) [21,23]. Although CNTs may improve detection
of glucose, fabrication of such sensors implies necessity of immobi-
lization of nanotubes onto conventional electrodes, such as glassy
carbon electrode (GCE) [20,21]. The problem in this approach may
be a proper adhesion between the electrode and active material, as
well as higher costs and time consuming preparations.
A lately developed solution to the problems mentioned above,
is the in situ synthesis of the electroactive Ni-based materials.
Research area involves different kinds of Ni-based alloys, such
as NiTi or Ni3 Al [18,25]. The latter having a unique mechanical
and physical properties, such as good mechanical strength, high
temperature resistance, good corrosion resistance in oxygen and

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apsusc.2017.02.188
0169-4332/© 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
 M. Jarosz et al. / Applied Surface Science 408 (2017) 96–102
carbon enriched atmospheres and its catalytic activity [24,25] is a
very promising material towards sensor production. That is why,
in this work we propose an amperometric glucose sensor based
on Ni3 Al alloy. Alloy samples were first etched chemically in order
to enlarge surface area and enhance their electroactivity. Further-
more, as-prepared samples were used to fabricate a non-enzymatic
glucose sensor. Using a simple oxidation process in an alkaline solu-
tion, an electroactive Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − film was formed, and such
an electrode was used as a direct nonenzymatic glucose sensor. The
proposed sensor exhibits a relatively good sensitivity, fast response
speed, satisfying detection limit and linear range.
2. Experimental
2.1. Preparation of Ni3 Al alloy samples
A microcrystalline Ni3 Al-based foil with a chemical composition
of Ni-22.1Al-0.26Zr-0.1B at.% produced by a multistage process of
heat treatment and cold rolling was used as a starting material.
Detailed information about production technology of the foil was
described previously by Jozwik et. al [26]. Prior to chemical etching,
Ni3 Al foil was polished using a 1000 grit SiC abrasive paper in order
to obtain the same starting situation prior to etching of foils.
As-prepared samples were cut into coupons (1 × 0.5 cm) and
degreased in acetone and ethanol, then dried in air. In order to opti-
mize the etching procedure of Ni3 Al foil, eight different solutions
and different etching times were tested. The best results in terms of
enlarged surface roughness of the alloy were observed for etching
in a mixture of H3 PO4 : HAc: HNO3 : H2 O (24:1:1:7 in volume) for
2 h at 30 ◦ C. Finally, the samples were rinsed with distilled water
and dried in air.
2.2. Electrochemical detection of glucose
For an electrochemical detection of glucose, the samples etched
for 2 h in H3 PO4 : HAc: HNO3 : H2 O (24:1:1:7) were chosen. Prior to
the electrochemical tests, the samples were kept in a dessicator in
order to avoid any contamination or oxidation of alloy samples.
Electrochemical experiments were conducted using a Reference
3000 potentiostat (Gamry, USA) in a conventional three electrode
configuration. As a working electrode, etched Ni3 Al samples were
used, whereas a Pt grid and silver chloride electrode (Ag/AgCl) were
used as a counter and reference electrodes, respectively. All of the
measurements were conducted at room temperature (20 ± 2 ◦ C)
and the potentials were referenced against Ag/AgCl electrode.
In order to fabricate the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode, cyclic
voltammetry measurements were conducted in a 6 M NaOH solu-
tion using a scan rate of 100 mV s−1 . The potential range and
number of cycles were set from 0.0 to 0.6 V and 50, respectively.
During the sensor testing, the cyclic voltammetry measure-
ments were performed in the same three-electrode configuration
in a 0.1 M NaOH solution containing 5.5 mM glucose. The CVs were
registered within the potential range of −0.6–0.9 V at different
scanning rates ranging from 10 to 400 mVs-1 . Chronoamperomet-
ric measurements were performed in a 0.1 M NaOH solution at
a potential step of 0.5 V. Measurements were conducted for the
period of 900 s and every 50 s, 50 ␮l additions of glucose at the
concentration of 4.8 ␮M were injected in the solution.
2.3. Surface characterization of the alloy samples
At the initial stage, a phase composition analysis of Ni3 Al-based
foil was performed by X-ray diffraction using a Seifert 3003 diffrac-
tometer equipped with a monochromated Co K␣ radiation source
at operating parameters of 30 mA, 50 kV and a step size 0.02◦ per
97
Table 1
EDS analyses of main components of the as-received Ni3 Al alloy and samples after
chemical etching for 2 h in H3 PO4 : HAc: HNO3 : H2 O (24:1:1:7).
Element % wt.
As-received Ni3 Al alloy Al 11.8 ± 0.2
Ni 87.2 ± 0.9
Ni3 Al after chemical Al 10.9 ± 0.2
etching Ni 82.8 ± 1.0
O 3.8 ± 0.3
3 s. The present phase was identified by use of the JCPDS library
(PDF card No 650144).
The morphological observations of Ni3 Al-based foil surface
before and after chemical etching were carried out using a
Quanta 3D FEG scanning electron microscope (SEM). The chemi-
cal composition analyses were performed with energy dispersive
spectrometry (EDS) using an EDAX Apollo X detector. Addition-
ally, in order to determine the surface roughening of the Ni3 Al foil
after chemical etching, the analyses of intensity profiles of SEM sur-
face were performed by using Nikon NIS-Elements AR microscope
imaging software.
X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (ESCA/XPS) measurements
on as-received, etched and oxidized samples were performed using
a system equipped with the hemispherical analyzer SES R4000
(Gammadata Scienta) with a Mg K␣ X-ray source (1253.6 eV,
200 W). The energy resolution of the system for an Ag 3d5/2 excita-
tion line was 0.9 eV. The analyzer was calibrated according to ISO
15472:2010 standard. During the measurements, vacuum was kept
at approximately 5 × 10−10 mbar. The samples were mounted in the
dedicated holder. The analyzed surface area was about 3 mm2 . The
electron binding energy (BE) scale of the acquired spectra was cal-
ibrated for a maximum of C 1s core excitation at BE of 285 eV. The
spectra were processed in CasaXPS 2.3.12 program. In the spec-
tra, the background was approximated by a Shirley profile. The
spectra deconvolution into a minimum number of the components
was done by application of the Voigt-type line shapes (70:30 Gaus-
sian/Lorentzian product). The chemical states were ascribed to the
deconvoluted components of the spectra according to the data
found in the literature [27–29].
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Surface characterization of Ni3 Al alloy prior and after
chemical etching
The investigated foil exhibits a single phase structure—an

ordered secondary solution ␥ based on the intermetallic Ni3 Al
phase (Fig. 1a) with a mean grain size of approximately 10 ␮m.
The EDS analyses (Table 1) showed that the composition of an alloy
consists mainly of Ni and Al. On the contrary, the surface of Ni3 Al
foil after chemical etching showed a significant surface develop-
ment (Fig. 1d). A surface development was also confirmed by the
intensity profiles for each sample (Fig. 1b and e for as-received
and etched, respectively). The analysis of intensity profiles and 3D
images of surfaces proved that, the surface roughness of Ni3 Al alloy
was significantly increased by chemical etching. As expected, the
analysis of chemical composition (Table 1) demonstrated existence
of nickel and aluminum as main alloy components. Moreover, small
amounts of oxygen were found.
The distribution of chemical elements on the Ni3 Al alloy surface
did not show clear chemical segregations of the main components
of the alloy (Fig. 2). The oxygen exists on the surface like a uniformly
distributed thin layer.
The XRD analysis of examined foil before chemical etching
showed a single Ni3 Al- ordered phase composition with existence
both fundamental and superlattice lines (Fig. 3a).
98 M. Jarosz et al. / Applied Surface Science 408 (2017) 96–102

Fig. 1. SEM microstructures of as-received (a–c) and etched (d–f) Ni3 Al-based alloys: (a, d) top views of the alloy surface, (b, e) top views of alloy surfaces along with the
intensity profiles (arrows indicate the direction of scanning), (c, f) 3D intensity profiles of examined structures. Etching was performed for 2 h in the H3 PO4 : HAc: HNO3 : H2 O
(24:1:1:7) solution.

Fig. 2. Distribution of the chemical elements on the surface of the Ni3 Al-based foil after chemical etching in the mixture of H3 PO4 :HAc: HNO3 :H2 O (24:1:1:7 in volume) for
2 h at 30 ◦ C.

The intensity of fundamental peak (200) can be attributed to
a texture deformation due to the forming process of as-received
samples. After chemical etching, structural homogeneity and tex-
ture is preserved, though the intensity of characteristic peaks is
significantly decreased (Fig. 3b). The observed intensity changes of
superlattice lines (100), (110) and (210) suggest a decrease in struc-
ture ordering, what can be a consequence of top surface changes.
More detailed information about the samples was obtained from
XPS measurements. The survey spectra confirmed that both etch-
ing and electrochemical oxidation in the alkaline solution led to
 M. Jarosz et al. / Applied Surface Science 408 (2017) 96–102 99

Fig. 3. XRD diffraction pattern of (a) the as-received Ni3 Al-based intermetallic alloy foil and (b) an alloy after chemical etching for 2 h in H3 PO4 : HAc: HNO3 : H2 O (24:1:1:7).

a decrease in the Al content in samples (Fig. S1, Supplementary
information).
Further information was obtained from the specific spectra,
namely Ni 2p (Fig. 4a), Al 2p (Fig. 4b) and O 1s (Fig. 4c).
The O 1s spectra were deconvoluted into four component
peaks: (A) O-metal contribution from metal oxides, (B) O H con-
tribution from hydroxyl group, (C) O C component from organic
carbon compounds (short aliphatic compounds) and (D) O C + H2 O
component also from organic (aromatic or coupled) compounds
(Fig. 4a). The assignation of peak components on a basis of elec-
tron binding energies is collected in Table S1 (Supplementary
information). The oxygen-metal bonds are observed at all surfaces
covered by nickel oxides and their intensities (surface concentra-
tion) remain independent of the Ni3 Al alloy treatment. The most
significant changes are observed for the O H peak. In comparison
to the as-received and etched samples, the O H component for
the oxidized sample is significantly greater. It is due to the oxida-
tion/hydroxylation process occurring in 6 M NaOH and resulting
in formation of Ni(OH)2 and Al(OH)4 − on the surface of the alloy.
The process will be described later on. The components C and D,
ascribed to organic compounds, can be a result of using the etching
mixture containing acetic acid.
The Ni 2p spectra can be deconvoluted into four doublets (fol-
lowed by respective shake-up satellites) related to the following
components: (A) Ni-Al, (B) Ni2+ -O (oxide component), (C) Ni2+ -
OH, and (D) Ni2+ -O (salt related component) (Fig. 4b). For the
as-received sample, there is a clearly observed component related
to nickel in the alloy, whereas after etching and oxidation its inten-
sity significantly and gradually decreases. It can be attributed to the
fact that after oxidation in concentrated NaOH, Ni(OH)2 is formed
on the surface and consequently the intensity of the Ni2+ -OH peak
increases. Therefore, we can assume that both etching and oxida-
tion processes reduce the contribution of the metallic component
on the surface of the alloy. Moreover, the oxide component rep-
resented by B spectrum component in Fig. 4b disappears when
the oxidized sample is considered. This also proves that nickel
hydroxide was successfully obtained on the surface of the alloy. The
component D may be ascribed to the Ni2+ -O bond that comes from
the salt, e.g., Al2 NiO4 . The intensity of this peak increases for the
etched and oxidized samples, which may be caused by the chemical
reactions occurring on the surface of the alloy leading to a formation
of the aluminum-nickel salt.
Finally, the Al 2p (partly overlapped with Ni 3p) spectra for
the as-received, etched and oxidized samples are shown in Fig. 4c.
After deconvolution of the spectra, two doublet electronic states
are observed for all samples, i.e. (A) Al-Ni, and (B) Al3+ -O. The one
at lower BE can be ascribed to metallic Al in the alloy. Its inten-
sity increases for the etched and oxidized samples, but the binding
energy is shifted slightly towards lower energies (from 71.66 to
71.16 eV). The latter represents the component ascribed to the pres-
ence of Al2 O3 on the surface of the alloy. The intensity of this
component decreases for the etched and oxidized samples. In addi-
tion, for the oxidized sample there is one more component that can
be assigned to Al3+ -OH type of bonding. Most likely, it represents
Al(OH)4 − ions that are formed due to oxidation of the alloy in con-
centrated NaOH. However, it may also be described as a component

Fig. 4. XPS O 1s (a), Ni 2p (b) and Al 2p with Ni 3p (c) spectra of Ni3 Al alloy: as-received (blue line), etched for 2 h in H3 PO4 : HAc: HNO3 : H2 O (24:1:1:7) (green line) and
oxidized in 6 M NaOH (red line). (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.).
100 M. Jarosz et al. / Applied Surface Science 408 (2017) 96–102

Fig. 5. Successive cyclic voltammograms (50 cycles) obtained at the Ni3 Al alloy electrode cycled between 0 and 0.45 V vs. Ag/AgCl in 6 M NaOH at a scan rate of 100 mV s−1
(for the clarity of the figure, only 1st, 5th, and then every tenth cycle are shown).

from Al2 NiO4 . Nonetheless, XPS measurements proved that after

chemical etching of Ni3 Al samples, metallic components of the alloy
are reduced. Moreover, oxidation of etched samples allows form-
ing nickel and aluminum hydroxides species on the surface of the
alloy.

3.2. Fabrication of the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode

The Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode was fabricated by cyclic

voltammetry using the Ni3 Al alloy electrode in a concentrated alka-
line solution. Fig. 5 shows the voltammograms acquired in 6 M
NaOH at a scan rate of 100 mV s−1 for 50 cycles.
Cyclic voltammograms show two characteristic peaks visible at
the potentials of about 0.26 V and 0.18 V, respectively. They may be
ascribed to the redox couple of Ni2+ /Ni3+ , and the reaction occurring
in the system is as follows [19]:

Ni(OH)2 + OH − ↔ NiOOH + H2 O + e− (1)

Contrary to the previously reported studies [18,30], due to the

presence of hydroxides on the surface of etched samples, no peak
representing an irreversible oxidation of Ni to Ni(OH)2 in the alka-
line solution was observed, though during the first cycle, anodic
and cathodic peaks are slightly shifted towards positive potentials.
At the same time, hydrolysis of Al2 O3 and dissociation of Al(OH)3
occur at the surface of Ni3 Al alloy, accordingly to the reactions Fig. 6. (a) Cyclic voltammograms of the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode without an
represented below [30]: addition of glucose at a scan rate 10 mV s−1 (black line) and at different scan rates
(10–400 mV s−1 ) in 0.1 M NaOH containing 5.5 mM of glucose. (b) Linear dependence
Al2 O3 + 3H2 O ↔ 2Al(OH)3 (2) of the cathodic and anodic peak currents vs. the square root of the scan rate.

Al(OH)3 + OH ↔ −
Al(OH)−
4 (3)

In the as-received and etched Ni3 Al samples, Al2 O3 component
was the most significant one (see Fig. 4c). It suggested that initially
aluminum oxide was present on the sample surface and then it
underwent the reaction presented in Eq. (2). On the other hand,
when samples were treated in the concentrated NaOH solution,
Al(OH)−4 species appeared (Eq. (3)). According to Xu et al. [30], in an
alkaline solution, the predominant Al species was Al(OH)− 4 which
was confirmed by XPS measurements (component C in Fig. 4c).
To sum up, the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − system was successfully
obtained by oxidation of the Ni3 Al alloy in an alkaline solution using
a cyclic voltammetry method.
3.3. Electrocatalytic oxidation of glucose
Electrocatalytic activity of the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode pre-
pared electrochemically from the Ni3 Al alloy were tested towards
glucose oxidation. Cyclic voltammetry measurements in a 0.1 M
NaOH solution without an addition of glucose and in the presence
of 5.5 mM of glucose at different scan rates are shown in Fig. 6a. As
can be seen, in the absence of glucose no ameprometric response
was observed. On the other hand, when glucose is added to the solu-
tion, both cathodic and anodic peaks are observed. Moreover, for
both cathodic and anodic peaks a linear relationship between the
peak current and the square root of the scan rate was observed. Lin-
earity was sustained for the scanning rates from 10 to 100 mVs-1 For
higher sweep rates (200 and 400 mVs-1 ), some deviations from lin-
earity were observed. It may be assumed that at relatively low scan
rates, a diffusion-controlled charge transfer occurs. An enlarged
view of oxidation part of the cyclic voltammograms is presented
in Fig. S2 (Supporting information).
The oxidation of glucose on the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode
occurs accordingly to the reaction below [18,31]:
Ni3+ + glucose → Ni2+ + gluconolactone (4)
 M. Jarosz et al. / Applied Surface Science 408 (2017) 96–102 101

Table 2
Properties of non-enzymatic Ni-based electrodes used for glucose detection.

Electrode Sensitivity (␮AmM-1 cm-2) Linear range (mM) LOD (␮M) Response time (s) Reference
a
c-Ni(OH)2 HR 1569 0.002–3.8 0.6 10 [17]
Ni Np/SMWNTsb 1438 0.0001–1 0.5 3 [21]
Ni-CNT 1384.1 0.005–2 2 3 [32]
NiNWAsc 1043 0.0005–7 0.1 <10 [33]
Ni-SWCNTs 907 0.001–0.9 0.3 2 [34]
Ni(OH)2 /TiO2 192 0.03–14 8 <1 [18]
Ni/Al-LDH/CHTd 0.182 Up to 8.6 10 [35]
Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − 796 0.025–0.45 47.6 3 this work
a
Chemical bath deposited hollow Ni(OH)2 nanorod arrays.
b
Nickel nanoparticles loaded straightly in multi-wall carbon nanotubes.
c
Nickel nanowire arrays.
d
Ni/Al layered double hydroxide nanoflakes with chitosan.

Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode is quite high, comparing to electrodes

based on NiTi alloys (Table 2). It is probably due to a higher surface
density of electroactive sites at the electrode, provided by Al(OH)4 −
species.

4. Conclusions

The Ni3 Al-based alloy was used to fabricate an amperomet-

ric glucose sensor. In order to obtain high surface roughness and
expose more electroactive sites the alloy was subjected to chem-
ical etching. The performed XPS measurements confirmed that
both etching and oxidation processes lead to the loss of Al com-
ponent. A simple one-step method based on potential cycling in
an alkaline solution was applied to fabricate the amperometric
Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − glucose sensor. The presence of hydroxides on
the alloy surface was also confirmed by XPS measurements. It was
demonstrated that the electrode showed good sensitivity towards
glucose detection with a relatively fast response time. A linear range
was not as high as for the nanosized materials, though such macro-
scopic Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrodes may be applied as a potential
non-enzymatic glucose sensor.

Acknowledgements

A financial support from the Polish National Centre for Research

Fig. 7. (a) Amperometric response of the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode to differ-
ent concentrations of glucose in 0.1 M NaOH at 0.5 V vs. Ag/AgCl. (b) Calibration
curve of the response current vs. glucose concentration according to the chronoam-
perometric curve shown in A. Standard deviations were calculated for triplicate
measurements.
When glucose diffuses to the surface of the electrode, its rapid
oxidation by Ni3+ occurs. Afterwards, at the applied anodic poten-
tial Ni2+ ions are oxidized to Ni3+ as it was shown in Eq. (1).
and Development under grants No. 209 874 and 246 201 is
gratefully acknowledged. The study was also supported by the
Marian Smoluchowski Krakow Research Consortium “Matter-
Energy-Future” Leading National Research Centre (KNOW). The
research was partially carried out with the equipment purchased
thanks to the financial support of the European Regional Devel-
opment Fund in the framework of the Polish Innovation Economy
Operational Program (contract POIG.02.01.00-12-023/08).
Appendix A. Supplementary data

3.4. Chronoamperometric detection of glucose
−
In order to assess the performance of the Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4
electrode towards glucose sensing, chronoamperometric measure-
ments were performed. Fig. 7a shows the amperometric response
of the studied electrode to successive additions of glucose at the
applied potential of 0.5 V.
The Ni(OH)2 /Al(OH)4 − electrode produced a relatively fast cur-
rent response (∼3 s) towards successive additions of glucose.
Moreover, the corresponding calibration curve (Fig. 7b) exhibited
a linear range from 0.025 mM to 0.45 mM, and the sensitivity of
the electrode was 796 ␮AmM-1 cm-2 . The limit of detection (LOD)
was 47.6 ␮M at signal-to-noise (S/N) ratio of 3. As for the electrode
based on non-nanosized material, the characteristics of the pro-
posed sensor are relatively good. Especially, the sensitivity of the
Supplementary data associated with this article can be found, in
the online version, at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apsusc.2017.02.
188.
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