Universal Flexible Wearable Biosensors for Noninvasive Health Monitoring

Abstract

Sweat, with its abundant biomarkers, is a highly appealing biofluid for personalized health monitoring and management. Noninvasive wearable sweat sensors hold great potential in this regard. However, developing an easy-to-prepare, highly sensitive, precise, and versatile wearable biosensor remains challenging. Herein, we report a universal electrochemical wearable biosensor for the accurate and sensitive detection of glucose, uric acid, and lactate in human sweat samples. A Pt nanoparticle-deposited nitrogen-doped mesoporous carbon/reduced graphene oxide composite (PNGO) was synthesized rapidly by using a simple multistage self-assembly strategy. The detection was carried out using electrodes modified with PNGO and enzyme-immobilized membranes, achieving high sensitivities (glucose: 15.33 μA mM^-1 cm^-2, uric acid: 103.2 μA mM^-1 cm^-2, lactate: 219.1 μA mM^-1 cm^-2), along with excellent selectivity, reproducibility, and stability. Based on the excellent performance of the biosensor, we investigated its reliability in detecting sweat targets during physical exercise and assessed its utility for monitoring human health status through glucose and purine dietary challenges, observing trends consistent with blood results. The integrated wearable flexible patch constructed in this work can provide periodic information related to sweat chemistry, and the low-cost electrode suggests the potential for large-scale manufacturing. Thus, it shows extraordinary promise for promotion and application in human health and training management.

Keywords: enzyme sensor; health monitor; mesoporous carbon; sweat metabolites; wearable.