Electrochemical sensing platform based on CuO@CeO2 hybrid oxides

•CuO@CeO2 catalytic materials containing five loads of CuO on CeO2 were prepared.•Cyclic voltammetry revealed proactive redox behavior of all these specimens.•Redox properties were in accordance with the stoichiometric loadings of CuO.•10CuO@CeO2 was found to exhibit lowest charge transfer resistance in EIS study.•10CuO@CeO2 substantiated prominent electro catalysis for methanol and glucose.

Advanced functional materials were synthesized to obtain catalytic compositions of CuO@CeO2 hybrid oxides (xCuO@CeO2, x = 5–25 wt%) by means of precipitation/impregnation method. Morphological characteristics of the materials were studied through FTIR, XRD, SEM, EDX, TEM and PSD analyses. Glassy carbon (GC) modified with these materials was used as a sensing platform. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) was carried out to assess the electrical properties; cyclic voltammetry was performed to investigate the redox nature of the catalysts. The redox properties of the materials were in accordance with EDX analysis. Application study for glucose and methanol electro oxidation was also carried out via cyclic voltammetry. All the prepared samples proved to be potential materials for electro analysis applications, however 10CuO@CeO2 was found to exhibit highly improved available surface area, lowest charge transfer resistance (via EIS), and hence better potentiality as electro catalyst. 10CuO@CeO2 composition mediated a fast electron transfer response for both the model analytes. Oxidation of methanol was shown to be of diffusion control nature and was rendered electro catalytic as evaluated through current function versus scan rate plots. The optimized material possessed significant sensitivity of 37.68 μA mM− 1 cm− 2 with a wide detection range (2–26 mM) for glucose electroxidation.