Non-enzymatic glucose sensor using mesoporous carbon screen-printed electrodes modified with cobalt phthalocyanine by phase inversion

The development of non-enzymatic glucose electrochemical sensors is still required to be used for the determination of glucose in complex biological media. This study presents a straightforward and remarkably efficient tool for the preparation of highly stable and sensitive glucose electrochemical sensors based on the deposition of cobalt phthalocyanine (CoPc) onto mesoporous carbon screen-printed electrodes (MCs). Results show that the MC electrochemical activation (aMC) followed by phase inversion (PI), which consisted of drop casting of CoPc in dimethylformamide onto a wetting electrolyte leading to the electrode aMC-CoPc/PI, enhanced sensitivity towards glucose determination in complex media. The beneficial need for MC surface activation and PI has been explored by scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, cyclic voltammetry and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. The aMC-CoPc/PI electrode exhibited the highest electrocatalytic activity of the series (namely, MC-CoPc, MC-CoPc/PI and aMC-CoPc) towards glucose oxidation. By using square wave voltammetry technique, the aMC-CoPc/PI glucose electrochemical sensor demonstrated a sensitivity of 22.3 µA mM−1 and a low detection limit of 27.4 µM (S/N = 3) in a linear dynamic range of 0.1 to 3.5 mM. Additionally, it also displayed high selectivity, robust stability, repeatability and reproducibility toward the quantification of glucose concentration in complex samples such as horse serum, intravenous glucose saline solution and culture medium for sperm cells.