Previous work in our lab has shown that stencil-printed carbon ink electrodes fabricated in the lab can be used for the electrochemiluminescent detection of biogenic amines with a smartphone detector in food-safety applications. These electrodes have applications in the development of point of care and portable analytical devices. Electrodes fabricated in lab have been shown to be more cost effective and allow us to customize the design. The study here seeks to improve the durability and reliability of these screen-printed carbon ink electrodes and to improve the design of our 3D printed light-tight case in which we photograph the reaction. Our previous electrodes were fabricated on thin plastic transparencies, and we observed that the electrode leads scratched off after regular use. The transparencies were traditionally used with projectors that have become obsolete. Therefore, these transparencies are no longer being produced and are difficult to find. To maximize durability and to modernize our electrodes we investigated the use of a 3D printed substrate. When the 3D printed surface replaced the transparency, we did not see a significant change in the cyclic voltametric behavior of the oxidation of tris(2,2’-bipyridyl)ruthenium(II) chloride, a common luminophore in electrochemiluminescence, with the co-reactant 2-(dibutylamino)ethanol. We did see an improvement in the durability and reliability of the electrodes. To completely abandon the use of plastic transparencies, we also investigated the fabrication of electrodes with craft vinyl. The fabrication with craft vinyl did not change the behavior of the electrodes. The light-tight casing improvements were studied by comparing the ECL intensities of the reaction between tris(2,2’-bipyridyl)ruthenium(II) chloride and 2-(dibutylamino)ethanol. The improvement to the light-tight casing improved the portability of our experimental set up as the experiments no longer needed to be performed in a dark lab.

Use of 3D printed materials for the fabrication of electrochemiluminescent sensors

ACS Spring 2022

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.