Influence of hole mobility on the response characteristics of p-type nickel oxide thin film based glucose biosensor Original Research Article

RF sputtered p-type nickel oxide (NiO) thin film exhibiting tunable semiconductor character which in turns enhanced its functional properties. NiO thin film with high hole mobility is developed as a potential matrix for the realization of glucose biosensor. NiO thin film prepared under the optimized deposition conditions offer good electrical conductivity (1.5 × 10−3 Ω−1-cm−1) with high hole mobility (2.8 cm2 V−1 s−1). The bioelectrode (GOx/NiO/ITO/glass) exhibits a low value of Michaelis–Menten constant (Km = 1.05 mM), indicating high affinity of the immobilized GOx toward the analyte (glucose). Due to the high surface coverage (2.32 × 10−7 mol cm−2) of the immobilized enzyme on to the NiO matrix and its high electrocatalytic activity, the prepared biosensor exhibits a high sensitivity of 0.1 mA (mM−1-cm−2) and a good linearity from 25 to 300 mg dL−1 of glucose concentration with fast response time of 5 s. Various functional properties of the material (mobility, crystallinity and stress) are found to influence the charge communication feature of NiO thin film matrix to a great extent, resulting in enhanced sensing response characteristics.