Abstract
Heavy metal ions, such as Pb2+ and Cd2+, are main sources of water quality contaminants. Whole-cell detection has recently been actively researched to use genetically modified bacteria to sense the presence of heavy metal ions in water or soil. Compared to common cell-free methods, such as immunosensor and electrochemical sensor, whole-cell sensors need simple sample preparation and can continuously sense metal contaminants in the environment with the cell culture. Nonetheless, whole-cell sensors so far have demonstrated sensitivity too low for water quality monitoring. In this work, we developed an integrated platform based on whole-cell detection. Our genetically-modified E. coli bacteria has a good specificity on lead and cadmium. The platform integrates the light source, cultured cells and the detector for the first time. The integrated platform shows good sensitivity. Limits of detection for Pb2+ and Cd2+ are 518 ppb and 44.8 ppb respectively.
Published Version
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