Noble Metal Construction for Electrochemical Nonenzymatic Glucose Detection

Precise glucose monitoring is needed to meet the growing demand of blood glucose determination in diabetes diagnosis. In spite of good selectivity and high sensitivity of enzyme-based glucose sensors, the activity of enzyme is sensitive to pH and temperature, which makes them unstable in detecting glucose level. Alternatively, nonenzymatic electrocatalysts have attracted intensive attention because of their chemical and thermal stability. Noble metal (NM) electrocatalysts based on Pt, Au, and Pd exhibit high activity and stability for the oxidation of glucose in both neutral and alkaline environments, further showing promising potential in the field of nonenzymatic glucose sensors. Since the electrocatalytic ability of NM nanomaterials directly depends on the surface and interface states, it is very important to effectively control the surface and interface state of nanomaterials for preparing NM nanocatalysts with optimized catalytic performance. In this review, the fundamentals and development of glucose sensors are briefly introduced. Then, the modification strategies of NM nanomaterials and their applications in enzyme-free glucose detection are discussed from the surface construction and interface modification. Finally, the challenges and opportunities for NM materials in electrochemical nonenzymatic glucose detection are proposed.