Magnetic particles and cadmium sulfide nanoparticles tagging for signal-amplifying detection of nucleic acids

Abstract

A versatile DNA recognition system using cadmium sulfide nanoparticles (CdS NPs) as labels was proposed for ultrasensitive detection of specific sequence DNA based on target recycling. This strategy utilized the magnetic particles (MNPs) for the immobilization of linker DNA and CdS NPs and the subsequent target DNA hybridization. Using the unique characteristic of nicking endonuclease for cutting one specific strand of double strand DNA (ds DNA), the linker DNA could be transected and the target DNA could be liberated for re-hybridization and hence the amount of released CdS NPs was enhanced. Due to the advantage of the MNPs and signal amplification from the target recycling, the analyte DNA could be detected by the square-wave stripping voltammetry (SWV) in a wide linear range from 0.4 fM to 100 fM with the detection limit down to 0.08 fM. The proposed DNA detection strategy possesses high sensitivity, satisfactory reproducibility and excellent stability, which might have potential in other DNA biological assays.