Te–Au nanowires with multiple enzyme-like activities for glucose detection

Directed toward the limitations of natural enzymes in diabetes management, it is possible to design nano-enzymatic structures and modulate the activity as needed to obtain superior materials that are more suitable for the specific application environment. In this work, noble metal–semiconductor composite nanozymes [Te–Au nanowires (NWs)] were designed and their enzyme-like activities were systematically investigated for diabetes management. The results indicated that Te–Au NWs exhibited pH-switching multi-enzyme-like activities and adapted to a wider range of reaction conditions than natural enzymes. The kinetics of their enzyme-catalyzed reactions followed the Michaelis–Menten model, showing their substrate affinity similar to that of natural enzymes. Actually, the nanozymes showed reliable application stability, maintaining more than 80% of various enzyme activities under prolonged or extreme storage conditions. Furthermore, the nanozymes can be flexibly applied to various paths of glucose detection. For example, we constructed three different colorimetric detection methods to achieve the detection of glucose in saliva and blood. All three detection methods showed a wider linear range and lower limit of detection (LOD), among which the most optimal method was the combination of Te–Au NWs and glucose oxidase (GOx), with a linear range of 0.05–4 mM and a LOD of 2.11 μM. In summary, nanozymes with multiple enzyme-like activities have significant advantages and effectively address the limitations of natural enzymes in the application of diabetes management. Graphical Abstract