ZnO-CNT Nanostructures as Potential Materials for Non-Enzymatic H <sub/>2</sub> O <sub/>2</sub> Sensing

摘要： Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is widely used as an antibacterial, bleaching, decoloring, and oxidizing agent in various industrial fields. However, the exposure to and accumulation of high levels of H2O2 can cause oxidative stress to humans, leading to caducity and diseases due to its unstable and toxic nature. Moreover, H2O2 is a useful indicator for monitoring reactive oxygen species-related diseases in humans because it is generated as an intermediate product of many enzymatic reactions in normal aerobic metabolism. It is therefore essential to develop accurate and reliable methods of detecting H2O2 for industrial and biological purposes. Among the recently established methodologies, non-enzymatic amperometric detection of H2O2 has raised considerable attention owing to its high sensitivity, low cost, ease of operation, and quick response. To improve the electrochemical performance of this method, various redox mediators, especially noble-metal-containing substrates, have been used to fabricate chemically modified electrodes for the non-enzymatic amperometric detection of H2O2. Recently, we have reported many applications of metal oxide-decorated sp2-hybridized carbon nanostructures. Building on our previous studies, we describe herein the use of zinc oxide–carbon nanotubes (ZnO-CNT) for the preparation of modified electrodes exhibiting enhanced electrocatalytic activity for H2O2 reduction.