A silver nanowire aerogel for non-enzymatic glucose detection

Glucose redox is the indispensable method for biological energy supply, and its concentration in the organism is one of the most vital determinants of its health status. Nevertheless, nearly 10,000 organic substances that coexist with glucose in the blood hinder the glucose detection. As a result, developing a detection method that can feature high sensitivity and selectivity is extremely indispensable. In this work, a silver nanowire aerogel (AgNW-gel) was prepared for non-enzymatic glucose detection. The unique porous structure of aerogel and the high electrical conductivity of silver guarantee rapid electron transport and transfer. Furthermore, the presence of massive mesopores in AgNW-gel imparts high specific surface area which provides a large number of active sites. Compared to enzymatic glucose methods, the AgNW-gel, which is a non-enzymatic assay, has a lower environmental dependence. With the help of these characteristics, the glucose non-enzymatic sensor exhibits a high sensitivity of 1940 μA·mM−1· cm−2, a wide linear range from 1.0 to 3.5 mM, and a detection limit of 0.8 mM· cm2. In addition, the largest interference signal was only 4.4% of the glucose signal in the interference test for the five common interferents in blood.