Despite being researched for nearly five decades, chemical application of metallic glass is scarcely explored. Here we show electrochemical nonenzymatic glucose-sensing ability of nickel-niobium (Ni60Nb40) amorphous alloys in alkaline medium. Three different Ni60Nb40 systems with the same elemental composition, but varying microstructures are created following different synthetic routes and tested for their glucose-sensing performance. Among melt-spun ribbon, nanoglass, and amorphous-crystalline nanocomposite materials, nanoglass showed the best performance in terms of high anodic current density, sensitivity (20 mA cm-2 mM-1), limit of detection (100 nM glucose), stability, reproducibility (above 5000 cycles), and sensing accuracy among nonenzymatic glucose sensors involving amorphous alloys. When annealed under vacuum, only the heat-treated nanoglass retained a similar electrochemical-sensing property, while the other materials failed to yield desired results. In nanoglass, a network of glassy interfaces, compared to melt-spun ribbon, is plausibly responsible for the enhanced sensitivity.
Keywords: cyclic voltammetry; electrochemistry; nanoglass; nickel−niobium alloy; nonenzymatic glucose sensor.