Silicon Carbide Nanoparticles-Based Nanofibrous Membrane in Comparison With Thin-Film Enzymatic Glucose Sensor

This work presents, silicon carbide nanoparticles (SiCNPs) embedded in a conductive polymer (CP) to be electrospun to fabricate a nanofibrous membrane and a thin-film. Electrochemical enzymatic glucose sensing mechanism of an electrospun nanofibrous membrane (ENFM) of SiCNPs in a CP compared to a spin-coated-thin-film (SCTF) of SiCNPs in a CP. Fiber alignment in the form of a matrix is a key factor that determines the physical properties of nanofiber membrane compared to thin-film. It is found that glucose sensing electrodes formed by a SiCNPs-ENFM has enhanced binding of the glucose oxidase (GO
_x
) enzyme within the fibrous membrane as compared to a SiCNPs-SCTF. The SiCNPs-ENFM and SiCNPs-SCTF glucose sensing electrodes were characterized for morphology by using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and for electrochemical activity by using cyclic voltammetry (CV), electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and chronoamperometry (CA) methods. SiCNPs-ENFM based glucose electrodes shown a detection range from a 0.5 mM to 20 mM concentration with a better sensitivity of
$387.57~\mu \text{A}$
/gmMcm
²
, and low limit of detection (LOD) 552.89 nM compared to SiCNPs-SCTF with sensitivity of
$6.477~\mu \text{A}$
/gmMcm
²
and LOD of
$60.87~\mu \text{M}$
. The change in current level with SiCNPs-ENFM was ~14% contrast to ~75% with the SiCNPs-SCTF based glucose sensor over 50 days. The electrochemical analysis results demonstrated that the SiCNPs-ENFM electrode provides enhanced sensitivity, better limit of detection (LOD), and durability compared to SiCNPs-SCTF based glucose sensing electrode.