Chemically polymerized polyaniline films for the mass-production of biosensor devices

The widespread use of screen-printed electrodes in biosensor applications has meant that mass-production of disposable, inexpensive sensors has become feasible. However, the complexity of surface coatings that require difficult and time-consuming deposition procedures do not lend themselves to the same production conveniences. This article describes moves towards the development of an alternative to the electrochemical deposition of polyaniline on electrode surfaces for incorporation into an established sensor format. Chemical rather than electrochemical polymerization of the conducting polymer polyaniline enables a multitude of electrodes to be coated simultaneously, without the need for complex instrumentation. The aim of this work was to control the coating parameters such that a coating of polymer was deposited that displayed the optimum thickness and electrochemical properties of that previously optimized electrochemically. Deposition procedures were found to depend on the hydrophilicity of the underlying carbon paste electrode as well as on a variety of polymerization parameters.