An electrocatalytic glucose oxidation
reaction (GOR) is crucial
for building a high-efficiency biofuel cell for a more sustainable
society and constructing a sophisticated device to precisely detect
trace amounts of glucose in blood and food for a more healthy life.
Yet, the reported GOR catalysts suffer low activity (current induced
by catalysts toward 1 mM glucose in a 1 cm–2 electrode,
μA mM–1 cm–2), slow response,
and poor response to trace glucose. Herein, we fabricate noble-metal-free
WO3-decorated carbon nanotubes with strong W–C bonds
(WO3/CNT60) (CNT, carbon nanotube). In the GOR, WO3/CNT60 triggers an activity as high as 1960 μA mM–1 cm–2, a response time of only 3
s, and a response minimum of only 5 μM and exhibits outstanding
stability, anti-interference ability to impurities, and reusability.
The GOR performance of WO3/CNT60 is much better than the
WO3/CNT catalyst without W–C bonds (1320 μA
mM–1 cm–2, 10 s, 40 μM)
and the widely used noble-metal catalyst (270 μA mM–1 cm–2, 10 s, 25 μM). The strong W–C
bonds create more C–W–O–W bridge sites active
for catalyzing the GOR, thus enhancing the GOR performance of WO3/CNT60. These results open a new way for fabricating a noble-metal-free
high-efficiency biofuel cell and sophisticated device to precisely
detect trace amounts of glucose and are also helpful for detecting
and converting complex molecules like polyols and poly(carboxylic
acid)s.