Gold nanodendrites enriched with gold nanoclusters on carbon-fiber as flexible acetaminophen sensor for clinical diagnostics

In this work, we demonstrate a flexible acetaminophen (APAP) microsensor based on gold dendrites decorated with gold nanoclusters on flexible carbon fiber (AuDS-AuNC|FCF) microelectrodes. The AuDS-AuNC|FCF microelectrodes are fabricated with a facile and single-step electrochemical strategy1 for electrocatalytic oxidation and sensing acetaminophen in a 0.1 M phosphate buffer (PB) (pH ~7.4) solution. The as-developed AuDS-AuNC| FCF microsensors demonstrate excellent electrocatalytic oxidation of acetaminophen with a low oxidation potential of ~0.54 V (vs. Ag/AgCl) and high catalytic current of ~1.33 μA. This is because they have a lot of active sites, a large quantity of electrochemical active surface area (ECSA), and gold nanoclusters that are spread out homogeneously. The AuDS-AuNC|FCF microsensors exhibit fast sensing response time of ~5.0 s, low experimental detection limit of ~5.0 nM, high sensitivity of ~0.375 ± 0.017 mA μM-1 cm2 with a broad linear range of 5.0 nm–500.0 mM, good reproducibility, and possessed a robust anti-interference ability against sensing acetaminophen in the presence of potential interferences such as ascorbic acid, uric acid, adenine, guanine, glucose, etc. Notably, the present microsensor platform based on AuDS-AuNC|FCF microelectrodes is successfully tested for sensing acetaminophen in practical human serum samples, demonstrating its practicability in clinical diagnostics.

Hefayathullah, research scholar at SRM Institute of Science and Technology, working at the interface of materials electrochemistry, catalysis, and electrochemical sensing. His research focuses on designing active material systems through electrodeposition techniques to create high-density catalytic sites for sensitive and selective detection of clinically relevant molecules. His current work aims to advance scalable, low-cost, recycling electrochemical sensing systems for real-time and point-of-care biomedical diagnostics.