Ultrasmall CuS-BSA-Cu3(PO4)2 nanozyme for highly efficient colorimetric sensing of H2O2 and glucose in contact lens care solutions and human serum

Abstract This work reports on the synthesis of organic-inorganic hybrid nanoscale materials, CuS-BSA-Cu3(PO4)2. The developed nanoparticles were characterized by various techniques, such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), UV–vis absorption spectrophotometry, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and dynamic light scattering (DLS). The CuS-BSA-Cu3(PO4)2 were successfully applied as artificial colorimetric probes in sensing H2O2, the final outcome of glucose oxidation, and proved to be efficient peroxidase mimics for the catalytic conversion of a chromogenic substrate, 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB), into a blue colored oxidized product (oxTMB) which can be easily visualized by the naked eye and monitored by a great absorption peak at 654 nm in the UV–vis spectrophotometry. A highly efficient, rapid, sensitive, and selective determination of H2O2 and glucose have been achieved with very low detection limits of 22 nM, and 27.6 nM over 0–8 μM and 0–1000 μM linear ranges, respectively. Compared to CuS-BSA, CuS-BSA-Cu3(PO4)2 exhibited improved peroxidase-like catalytic activity. Based on these observations, the performance of this approach was successfully validated in contact lens care solutions and human serum samples.