Flexible Printed Reference Electrodes for Electrochemical Applications

Manjakkal, Libu; Shakthivel, Dhayalan; Dahiya, Ravinder

Abstract

This work presents screen-printed thick film reference electrodes (REs) on a polyethylene terephthalate substrate. The ion-conducting channel of presented screen-printed thick film Ag|AgCl|KCl electrodes are made from a composite of glass–KCl powder. With this new formulation the REs exhibit negligible variation in the potential (±4 mV), when evaluated under different bending states (radius 3, 5, and 7 mm). With a stable electrode potential and in-depth electrochemical studies, the utility of the presented REs for pH-sensing and flexible supercapacitor (SC) applications is demonstrated. With amperometric studies, we have shown that for pH-sensing applications, the presented REs can exhibit a sensitivity of 9 µA pH−1. At 1 mHz, the electrochemical investigations involving presented thick film REs and graphene-based SCs demonstrate a capacitance of 75 µF cm−2. With a flexible form factor, high endurance, and a miniature size, the presented RE has distinct advantages over conventional glass-based REs, particularly for emerging applications such as flexible sensing and for characterization of materials for energy storage devices.

Citation

Manjakkal, L., Shakthivel, D., & Dahiya, R. (2018). Flexible Printed Reference Electrodes for Electrochemical Applications. Advanced Materials Technologies, 3(12), Article 1800252. https://doi.org/10.1002/admt.201800252

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Online Publication Date: Sep 21, 2018
• Publication Date: 2018-12
• Deposit Date: Jul 19, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 20, 2022
• Journal: Advanced Materials Technologies
• Print ISSN: 2365-709X
• Electronic ISSN: 2365-709X
• Publisher: Wiley
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 3
• Issue: 12
• Article Number: 1800252
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/admt.201800252
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/2890690