Disposable pH Sensor on Paper Using Screen-Printed Graphene-Carbon Ink Modified Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles

The estimation of pH is vital to assess the biochemical and biological processes in a wide variety of applications ranging from water to soil, health, and environment monitoring. This work reports a screen-printed flexible and disposable pH sensor using the impedimetric method. The pH sensor was fabricated by screen printing graphenecarbon (G-C) modified zinc oxide (ZnO)-based active layer on a paper substrate and shows nearly three orders of change in impedancemagnitude in the pH range of 2-9. The sensor was carefully designed using COMSOL Multiphysics software to understand the influence of electrode geometry and the electrical potential developed across the structure. The developed sensor was used for pH monitoring of soil and exhibited high sensitivity of 5.27 k Omega/pH 2-8 with a correlation coefficient ( R-2) of 0.99. Finally, an IoT-enabled smart pH detection system was implemented for continuous pHmonitoring for potential application in digital agriculture. The outcome demonstrates that the presented flexible and disposable pH sensor could open new opportunities for monitoring of water, product process, human health, and chemical (or bio) reactions even by using small volumes of samples.

Automated summary

The estimation of pH is crucial in various applications, and this study presents a screen-printed flexible and disposable pH sensor that uses the impedimetric method. The sensor exhibits high sensitivity and can be used for pH monitoring of soil, potentially contributing to digital agriculture.