Controlling electrodeposited Ni layers by different-sized graphene oxides enables conductive e-textiles for the highly sensitive electrochemical detection of glucose

With the increasing popularity of wearable electronic devices, there is an urgent demand to develop electronic textiles (e-textiles) for device fabrication. Nevertheless, the difficulty in reconciliation between conductivity and manufacturing costs hinders their large-scale practical applications. Herein, we reported a facile and economic method for preparing conductive e-textiles. Specifically, nonconductive polypropylene (PP) was wrapped by reduced graphene oxide (rGO), followed by the electrodeposition of Ni nanoparticles (NPs). Notably, modulating the sheet size of graphene oxide (GO) resulted in controllable deposition of Ni NPs with adjustable size, allowing for controlled manipulations over the structures, morphologies, and conductivity of the obtained e-textiles, which influenced their performance in electrochemical glucose detection subsequently. The optimal material, denoted as Ni/rGO_0.2/PP, exhibited an impressive conductivity of 7.94 × 10⁴ S·m⁻¹. With regard to the excellent conductivity of the as-prepared e-textiles and the high electrocatalytic activity of Ni for glucose oxidation, the as-prepared e-textiles were subjected to glucose detection. It was worth emphasizing that the Ni/rGO_0.2/PP-based electrode demonstrated promising performance for nonenzymatic/label-free glucose detection, with a detection limit of 0.36 μM and a linear response range of 0.5 μM to 1 mM. This study paves the way for further development and application prospects of conductive e-textiles.