Large-scale manufacturing of functional single-atom ink for convenient glucose sensing

Printing techniques hold great potential in the manufacture of electronics such as sensors, micro-supercapacitors, and flexible electronics. However, developing large-scale functional conductive inks with appropriate rheological properties and active components still remains a challenge. Herein, through optimizing the formulations of ink, iron single sites supported N-doped carbon black (Fe1-NC) inks can serve as both conductive electrodes and high-reactive catalysts to realize convenient glucose detection, which pronouncedly reduces the dosage of enzyme and simplifies the sensors preparation. In detail, utilizing in-situ pyrolysis method, Fe1-NC single-atom catalysts (SACs) are prepared in bulk (dekagram-level). The batched Fe1-NC SACs materials can be uniformly mixed with modulated ink to realize the screen printing with high resolution and uniformity. Also, the whole scalable preparation and ink-functional process can be extended to various metals (including Co, Ni, Cu, and Mn). The introduction of highly active Fe1-NC sites reduces the amount of enzyme used in glucose detection by at least 50%, contributing to the cost reduction of sensors. The strategy in harnessing the SACs onto the carbon inks thus provides a broad prospect for the low-cost and large-scale printing of sensitive sensing devices.