ZnO nanorods integrated flexible carbon fibers for sweat cortisol detection

Sensors fabricated on fabrics provide an elevated ease of use for wearable sensors. Such sensors will play a critical role in detecting the elevations in the concentrations of biochemical markers in human sweat. The ability of making such measurements is becoming an important tool for non-invasive and real-time health monitoring. We present a yarn based flexible and superwettable electrochemical immunosensing strategy for highly selective and sensitive detection of cortisol in sweat. ZnO nanorods (ZnONRs) coated flexible carbon yarns were prepared using a hydrothermal method for immobilizing specific anti-cortisol antibodies and used as an immunosensing platform for detecting sweat cortisol levels. The morphology, elemental composition, crystallinity and specific surface area were analyzed using analytical techniques such as transmission electron microscopy (TEM), field emission scanning electron microscopy coupled energy dispersive X-ray analysis (FE-SEM/EDS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), FT-IR, Raman spectr...