Modified Surface Plasmon Resonance Sensor Research Articles

A polydopamine nanospheres modified fiber optic SPR biosensor for specific detection of C-reactive protein

C-reactive protein (CRP) is a vital inflammatory marker in humans and a key single marker of cardiovascular diseases. In this paper, the concentration of CRP was specifically detected by a polydopamine nanospheres (PDA-NPs) developed surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor with high accuracy. PDA-NPs is a self-polymerizing material that can be obtained from dopamine through the mussel adhesion effect. The PDA-NPs (diameter ≈ 100 nm) modified SPR sensor exhibits enhanced refractive index (RI) sensitivity and bio-sensitivity attributed to the large specific surface area and high surface reactivity of the PDA-NPs. The developed sensor demonstrates a RI sensitivity of 2427.68 nm/RIU, presenting a 55.7% increase compared to the raw sensor (RI sensitivity was 1559.08 nm/RIU). Moreover, the developed biosensor is used to detect CRP specifically. The bio-sensitivity reaches 0.09 nm/(µg/mL), while the limit of detection (LOD) reaches 0.22 µg/mL. These findings indicate that the developed biosensor can specifically detect CRP with a low LOD. Therefore, this PDA-NPs modified biosensor has great potential in clinical detection and other bio-detection filed.

A bioinspired peptide matrix for the detection of 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene (TNT)

A novel peptide-based three-dimensional probe called “peptide matrix,” inspired by the antibody paratope region, was fabricated on a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor chip to enhance the sensitivity of detecting the explosive 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene (TNT). Although peptide aptamer is an attractive candidate for a molecular recognition probe because of its ease of synthesis and chemical stability, it still has difficulty in applying to highly sensitive (i.e. parts-per-billion (ppb) or sub-ppb level) detections. Thus, we developed the concept of peptide matrix structure, which is constructed by consecutive disulfide bond formation between a large number of peptide fragments. This robust three-dimensional structure displays multiple binding sites which can efficiently associate with each TNT molecule. The peptide matrix lowered the dissociation constant (KD) by two orders of magnitude compared to the linear peptide aptamer, estimating KD as 10.1 nM, which is the lowest concentration reported by using peptide-based TNT probe. Furthermore, the concentration limit of detection of peptide matrix modified SPR sensor was 0.62 ppb, and hence comparable to single-chain variable fragment (scFv)-based TNT sensors. To our knowledge, this is the first report demonstrating peptide matrix fabrication and its application for small explosive molecule detection. This peptide matrix-based approach, which has the advantage of simple synthesis and high sensitivity, will be applicable to many other small-molecule label-free detections.

GeSe nanosheets modified surface plasmon resonance sensors for enhancing sensitivity

Abstract Germanium selenide (GeSe) nanosheets are stable and inexpensive and considered to have a great potential for photovoltaic applications, however we have demonstrated that GeSe nanosheets are also promising for sensing technology, in this paper. By spin-coating the GeSe nanosheets on the surface of noble metal (Au), we have obtained a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor with significantly enhanced sensitivity, and the performance of the sensor is closely related to the thickness of the GeSe film. By detecting different refractive index solutions, we have obtained the optimized sensitivity with 3581.2 nm/RIU (which is nearly 80% improvement compared to traditional SPR sensors) and figure of merit with 14.37 RIU−1. Moreover, the proposed SPR sensor was vastly superior in sensing Pb2+ heavy metal ions after coating it with chitosan and GeSe composite. A maximum sensitivity of 30.38 nm/μg/l has been verified, which is nearly six times better than that of conventional SPR sensor. Our results demonstrated that GeSe nanosheets overlayer with modified SPR sensor has its great potential in heavy metal detection and chemical-specific molecular identification.

A novel polymerization of ultrathin sensitive imprinted film on surface plasmon resonance sensor

A new surface-initiated polymerization based on pasting the initiator on a sensor chip surface was applied to prepare a malachite green (MG) imprinted ultrathin film on a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor. First, the initiator (2,2-azoisobutyronitrile) was pasted on the gold surface using polyvinyl chloride (PVC). The initiator-covered gold chip was then soaked in a pre-polymerization solution prepared by dissolving methacrylic acid (functional monomer), ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (cross-linker), and MG (template) in DMSO in a weighing bottle. Finally, the weighing bottle was placed in a vacuum oven and thermal-initiated polymerization was conducted at 60 °C for 16 h. This method was simple and time-saving compared with the commonly used surface-initiated polymerization. More importantly, the molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) film prepared using this method was much thicker than that of commonly used methods; the adsorption quantity was also much larger. The MIP modified SPR sensor showed high sensitivity and selectivity as well as good stability in detecting MG. The results suggest that the ultrathin MIP film prepared using the new method in this study is suitable to serve as the recognition element of the SPR sensor.

Methods for research on immune complement activation on modified sensor surfaces

We have developed a methodological system consisting of a new surface sensitive quartz crystal microbalance with dissipation monitoring (QCM-D) sensor surfaces together with different surface modification methods for the investigation of surface associated complement activation in human sera. The QCM-D surface, 10 mm in diameter, was modified by spin-coating of poly(urethane urea) (PUUR) and polystyrene (PS). Some sensor surfaces were also sputtered with titanium (Ti) or modified by hydrophobic self-assembled monolayer (SAM) of an 18-carbon alkane thiol with a CH 3 end group. The amount of surface deposited complement protein was investigated by incubation of the modified sensor surfaces in human sera, followed by incubation with antibodies directed against complement factor 3c (C3c). The amounts of bound anti-C3c were then used as an arbitrary measure of surface induced complement activation. The order of complement activation of the different surfaces, as judged by three separate measurements per surface modification, was PUUR>PS=SAM>Ti. The Ti surface had a similar low degree of anti-C3c binding as the negative controls (heat inactivated sera). The novel QCM-D methodology was found to be very simple, accurate, sensitive and well suited as a screening method for complement activation and protein adsorption on different materials. We also compared the sensitivity of QCM-D method with surface plasmon resonance (SPR) for the quantification of protein adsorption and complement activation on gold sensor surfaces. The QCM-D method was equally sensitive as the SPR for the detection of protein adsorption from a solution independently if low flow rate (5 μl/min) was used. A slight increase in sensitivity was found at higher flow rate (30 μl/min). However, we found it difficult to use the SPR method on the Ti, PS and PUUR surfaces due to decreased light penetration of the modified SPR sensor chip.