Non-enzymatic glucose sensing by enhanced Raman spectroscopy on flexible 'as-grown' CVD graphene.

Unmodified, as-grown few layered graphene on copper substrates have been used for glucose sensing using Raman spectroscopy. Graphene with a stronger 2D band is a better Raman enhancer with significant fluorescence suppression and finer line widths of the Raman signals. The origin of the graphene enhanced Raman spectroscopy (GERS) signal of glucose is attributed to a fractional charge transfer (calculated to be 0.006 using electrochemical parameters) between glucose and graphene aided by a possible π-π interaction. Physiological concentrations of glucose (10-500 mg dl(-1)) in PBS have been used for the study. For each glucose concentration, the spectral reproducibility is within 5-25% as calculated by the relative standard deviation of several measurements. The intensity ratio of the 1122 cm(-1) peak of glucose and the 2D peak of graphene varied linearly with the glucose concentration and can be used as a calibration curve for unknown sample measurements.

Edge promoted ultrasensitive electrochemical detection of organic bio-molecules on epitaxial graphene nanowalls.

We report the simultaneous electrochemical detection of dopamine (DA), uric acid (UA) and ascorbic acid (AA) on three dimensional (3D) unmodified 'as-grown' epitaxial graphene nanowall arrays (EGNWs). The 3D few layer EGNWs, unlike the 2D planar graphene, offers an abundance of vertically oriented nano-graphitic-edges that exhibit fast electron-transfer kinetics and high electroactive surface area to geometrical area (EAA/GA≈134%), as evident from the Fe(CN)6(3-/4-) redox kinetic study. The hexagonal sp(2)-C domains, on the basal plane of the EGNWs, facilitate efficient adsorption via spontaneous π-π interaction with the aromatic rings in DA and UA. Such affinity together with the fast electron kinetics enables simultaneous and unambiguous identification of individual AA, DA and UA from their mixture. The unique edge dominant EGNWs result in an unprecedented low limit of detection (experimental) of 0.033 nM and highest sensitivity of 476.2 µA/µM/cm(2), for UA, which are orders of magnitude higher than comparable existing reports. A reaction kinetics based modeling of the edge-oriented 3D EGNW system is proposed to illustrate the superior electro-activity for bio-sensing applications.