Co₃O₄@CeO₂ hybrid flower-like microspheres: a strong synergistic peroxidase-mimicking artificial enzyme with high sensitivity for glucose detection

In recent years, the development of artificial nanostructured enzymes has received enormous interest in nanobiotechnology due to their advantages over natural enzymes. In the present work, different amounts (5, 10, and 20 wt%) of Co₃O₄ nanoparticle decorated CeO₂ hybrid flower-like microspheres (Co₃O₄@CeO₂) have been investigated for peroxidase-like activity and it was found that 10 wt% of Co₃O₄@CeO₂ exhibited excellent peroxidase-like activity for the catalytic oxidation of the 3,3',5,5'-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) substrate in the presence of H₂O₂. The formation of more Ce³⁺ ions associated with the oxygen vacancies and a strong synergistic interaction between CeO₂ and Co₃O₄ may be responsible for the enhanced peroxidase-like activity. Based on their peroxidase activity, Co₃O₄@CeO₂ hybrid microspheres were used for the colourimetric detection of glucose. It was found that Co₃O₄@CeO₂ hybrid microspheres showed a substantial enhancement in the detection selectivity. The limit of detection (LOD) was also improved with a limit as low as 1.9 μM. Thus, we believe that Co₃O₄@CeO₂ hybrid flower-like microspheres with high peroxidase-like activity can be exploited for biosensing applications.