Abstract
Nanosensors based on flexible polymers have emerged as powerful tools for next generation smart devices in the recent years. Here, we report a facile protocol to fabricate an immunosensor supported by a thermally resistant flexible polymer substrate (polyarylene ether nitrile, PEN). The immunosensor is a localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) optical sensor for in-vitro protein detection based on anti-body coated gold-silver bimetallic nanoparticles (Au-Ag NPs) immobilized on a PEN substrate. Plasmonic spectroscopy and morphological characterization show that the Au-Ag NPs essentially exhibit a more uniform size distribution and higher quality factors than those from single-component Au NPs. Furthermore, it should be noted that the robust PEN substrate in this nanosensor acts a flexible substrate to support Au-Ag NPs and immobilize the nanoparticles via quick thermal annealing at 290 °C. Thanks to these merits, a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) concentration as low as 1 ng/mL can be specifically discriminated via the prepared PEN/Au-Au NPs, which confirms that the protocol reported in this work can be readily adapted for the construction of various flexible immunosensors for different applications.
Highlights
Nowadays, flexible substrates bring significant benefits to the manufacture of various high-tech products [1,2]
A prostate-specific antigen (PSA) concentration as low as 1 ng/mL can be discriminated via the prepared polyarylene ether nitrile (PEN)/Au-Au NPs, which confirms that the protocol reported in this work can be readily adapted for the construction of various flexible immunosensors for different applications
We discovered that a rapid annealin treatment of the plasmonic substrate is able to create stable and uniform Au-Ag NPs on PEN substrate, demonstrating a higher quality localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) peak, which contributed to the fabrication of immunosensors based on a flexible polymer substrate for the sensitive and selective in-vitro detection of prostate specific antigen (PSA)
Summary
Flexible substrates bring significant benefits to the manufacture of various high-tech products [1,2]. A relatively long annealing time (~2 h) was required to obtain Au NPs, and their LSPR peaks normally exhibited larger full width at half maximum (FWHM) values, which implied that the flexible plasmonic substrate still needs to be greatly improved for practical sensing applications. It is well-known that gold-silver bimetallic nanoparticles (Au-Ag NPs) show improved optical properties compared to those of single-component Au or Ag NPs [30,31,32]. We discovered that a rapid annealin treatment of the plasmonic substrate is able to create stable and uniform Au-Ag NPs on PEN substrate, demonstrating a higher quality LSPR peak, which contributed to the fabrication of immunosensors based on a flexible polymer substrate for the sensitive and selective in-vitro detection of prostate specific antigen (PSA)
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