How many molecules are required to obtain a steady faradaic current from mediated electron transfer at a single nanoparticle on a supporting surface?

Single Nanotube Voltammetry: Current Fluctuations Are Due to Physical Motion of the Nanotube

Nanoimpacts of single palladium-coated carbon nanotubes on a gold substrate are studied to elucidate the origins of the fluctuation in the current-time response of the hydrogen oxidation reaction mediated at its surface. The chronoamperometric and cyclic voltammetric responses from a single nanotube immobilized on the gold surface were compared to analogous data on a carbon substrate to determine the possible influence of substrate material on the nanotube-electrode electrical contact. No significant distinction between the gold and carbon was found, indicating in light of the considerable differences in the substrate materials' intrinsic electronic structures that it is the nanomotion of a nanotube at the electrode surface which is likely responsible for the observed current modulation. This nanomotion creates a varying contact resistance, to which the noise in the current-time signal of the mediated reaction is attributed. In addition, stochastic ex-situ adsorption of single nanotubes onto the gold electrode followed by careful drying of the electrode surface was found to drastically reduce the current fluctuation, again implying that a contact resistance arising from physical motion of the nanotube at the electrode is responsible for the modulation of current.

Single Nanoparticle Voltammetry: Contact Modulation of the Mediated Current

The cyclic voltammetric responses of individual palladium-coated carbon nanotubes are reported. Upon impact-from the solution phase-with the electrified interface, the nanoparticles act as individual nanoelectrodes catalyzing the hydrogen-oxidation reaction. At high overpotentials the current is shown to reach a quasi-steady-state diffusion limit, allowing determination of the tube length. The electrochemical response of the individual nanotubes also reveals the system to be modulated by the electrical contact between the electrode and carbon nanotube. This modulation presents itself as fluctuations in the recorded Faradaic current.

Recent Advances in Voltammetry

Recent progress in the theory and practice of voltammetry is surveyed and evaluated. The transformation over the last decade of the level of modelling and simulation of experiments has realised major advances such that electrochemical techniques can be fully developed and applied to real chemical problems of distinct complexity. This review focuses on the topic areas of: multistep electrochemical processes, voltammetry in ionic liquids, the development and interpretation of theories of electron transfer (Butler-Volmer and Marcus-Hush), advances in voltammetric pulse techniques, stochastic random walk models of diffusion, the influence of migration under conditions of low support, voltammetry at rough and porous electrodes, and nanoparticle electrochemistry. The review of the latter field encompasses both the study of nanoparticle-modified electrodes, including stripping voltammetry and the new technique of 'nano-impacts'.

Sensing with nanopores--the influence of asymmetric blocking on electrochemical redox cycling current

Nanoporous redox cycling devices are highly efficient tools for the electrochemical sensing of redox-active molecules. By using a redox-active mediator, this concept can be exploited for the detection of molecular binding events via blocking of the redox cycling current within the nanopores. Here, we investigate the influence of different blocking scenarios inside a nanopore on the resulting redox cycling current. Our analysis is based on random walk simulations and finite element calculations. We distinguish between symmetric and asymmetric pore blocking and show that the current decrease is more pronounced in the case of asymmetric blocking reflecting the diffusion-driven pathway of the redox-active molecules. Using random walk simulations, we further study the impact of pore blocking in the frequency domain and identify relevant features of the power spectral density, which are of particular interest for sensing applications based on fluctuation analysis.