An easy-to-build laboratory virtual instrument engineering workbench-based potentiostat for electrochemical measurement

Potentiostats play a crucial role in the precise control of electrochemical cell potentials. This paper introduces LabStat - a user-friendly and easily constructed potentiostat - developed using Laboratory Virtual Instrument Engineering Workbench (LabVIEW), tailored for three- and two-electrode electrochemical analyses. The LabStat comprises a single-ended potentiostat circuit with an external control for adjusting the current delivered to the working electrode. This device can perform cyclic voltammetry, linear sweep voltammetry, and chronoamperometry, offering an adjustable current range of +/- 1000 mu A and a broad voltage range of +/- 10 V. Also, LabStat offers high-end noise rejection capabilities with low noise floor (10 nV/Hz), low distortion (0.0003% at 1 kHz), and an excellent signal-to-noise ratio (24.61 dB). Integrating a data acquisition card enables the device to achieve a voltage increment resolution of 10 mV and a current resolution of +/- 200 pA, making it a versatile and precise tool for electrochemical measurements. To validate its performance, LabStat is compared with a research-grade potentiostat through a series of experiments involving voltammetry and chronoamperometry using potassium ferricyanide as the standard solution. The comparative analysis demonstrated that LabStat performs on par with commercial potentiostats, confirming its reliability for laboratory use. Additionally, the device's application is further established by detecting and quantifying glucose using a two-electrode sensor. The results demonstrate that LabStat is easy-to-fabricate and robust for conducting electrochemical experiments with real-world sensors.