Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2011;6(9):e23783. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0023783. Epub 2011 Sep 13.
Although potentiostats are the foundation of modern electrochemical research, they have seen relatively little application in resource poor settings, such as undergraduate laboratory courses and the developing world. One reason for the low penetration of potentiostats is their cost, as even the least expensive commercially available laboratory potentiostats sell for more than one thousand dollars. An inexpensive electrochemical workstation could thus prove useful in educational labs, and increase access to electrochemistry-based analytical techniques for food, drug and environmental monitoring. With these motivations in mind, we describe here the CheapStat, an inexpensive (<$80), open-source (software and hardware), hand-held potentiostat that can be constructed by anyone who is proficient at assembling circuits. This device supports a number of potential waveforms necessary to perform cyclic, square wave, linear sweep and anodic stripping voltammetry. As we demonstrate, it is suitable for a wide range of applications ranging from food- and drug-quality testing to environmental monitoring, rapid DNA detection, and educational exercises. The device's schematics, parts lists, circuit board layout files, sample experiments, and detailed assembly instructions are available in the supporting information and are released under an open hardware license.
虽然电化学工作站是现代电化学研究的基础，但它们在资源匮乏的环境中，如本科实验室课程和发展中国家，应用相对较少。电化学工作站普及率低的一个原因是其成本，即使是最便宜的商业上可用的实验室电化学工作站也要卖到一千多美元。因此，一种廉价的电化学工作站在教育实验室中可能非常有用，并为食品、药物和环境监测等基于电化学的分析技术提供更多的使用机会。基于这些动机，我们在这里描述了 CheapStat，这是一种廉价（<80 美元）、开源（软件和硬件）、手持式电化学工作站，任何精通电路组装的人都可以构建。该设备支持执行循环伏安法、方波伏安法、线性扫描伏安法和阳极溶出伏安法所需的多种电位波形。正如我们所展示的，它适用于从食品和药品质量测试到环境监测、快速 DNA 检测和教育练习等广泛的应用。该设备的原理图、零件清单、电路板布局文件、示例实验和详细的组装说明可在支持信息中找到，并根据开放硬件许可证发布。
