Pt nanoparticles on ITO nanowires for electrochemical detection of L-ascorbic acid and dopamine

L-ascorbic acid (AA, also known as vitamin C) and dopamine (DA) play important roles in human life activities. When their concentrations are abnormal, they will cause diseases. Therefore, it is of great interest to develop an effective strategy to detect AA and DA levels. Here, anodic aluminum oxide (AAO) films were used as templates to fabricate indium-tin (InSn) alloy nanowires (NWs) by vacuum mechanical injection method, and then Pt nanoparticles were coated on the surface of the InSn NWs by means of the “in-situ discharge reduction” method. Subsequently, the composites were exposed in air for heat treatment to synthesize PtO2/indium-tin oxide (ITO) NWs. Finally, PtO2/ITO NWs were reduced under H2 atmosphere to obtain Pt/ITO NWs. The results show that the diameter of the InSn NWs is ∼40 nm and Pt nanoparticles with 2–5 nm are uniformly coated on the surface of the ITO NWs. Additionally, the performance of electrochemical detection of AA and DA on the Pt/ITO NWs electrode is tested by the cyclic voltammetry and differential pulse stripping voltammetry. The Pt/ITO NWs electrode has low detection limits in the detection of AA (66.7 µM) and DA (1 µM), which reveals the good electrochemical detection of AA and DA.