The application of an applied electrical potential to generate electrical fields and forces to enhance affinity biosensors

Affinity biosensors play a crucial role in clinical diagnosis, pharmaceuticals, immunology, and other areas of human health. Affinity biosensors rely on the specific binding between target analytes and biological ligands such as antibodies, nucleic acids, aptamers, or other receptors to primarily generate electrochemical or optical signals. Considerable effort has been put into improving the performance of the affinity technologies to make them more sensitive, efficient and reproducible, of the many approaches electrokinetic phenomena are a viable option. In this perspective, studies that combine electrokinetic phenomena with affinity biosensor are discussed about their promise for achieving higher sensitivity and lower detection limit.

Capacitive immunosensor for COVID-19 diagnosis

COVID-19 has spread worldwide and early detection has been the key to controlling its propagation and preventing severe cases. However, diagnostic devices must be developed using different strategies to avoid a shortage of supplies needed for tests' fabrication caused by their large demand in pandemic situations. Furthermore, some tropical and subtropical countries are also facing epidemics of Dengue and Zika, viruses with similar symptoms in early stages and cross-reactivity in serological tests. Herein, we reported a qualitative immunosensor based on capacitive detection of spike proteins of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the causative agent of COVID-19. The sensor device exhibited a good signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at 1 kHz frequency, with an absolute value of capacitance variation significantly smaller for Dengue and Zika NS1 proteins (|ΔC| = 1.5 ± 1.0 nF and 1.8 ± 1.0 nF, respectively) than for the spike protein (|ΔC| = 7.0 ± 1.8 nF). Under the optimized conditions, the established biosensor is able to indicate that the sample contains target proteins when |ΔC| > 3.8 nF, as determined by the cut-off value (CO). This immunosensor was developed using interdigitated electrodes which require a measurement system with a simple electrical circuit that can be miniaturized to enable point-of-care detection, offering an alternative for COVID-19 diagnosis, especially in areas where there is also a co-incidence of Zika and Dengue.

Design and Preparation of Sensing Surfaces for Capacitive Biodetection

Despite their high sensitivity and their suitability for miniaturization, biosensors are still limited for clinical applications due to the lack of reproducibility and specificity of their detection performance. The design and preparation of sensing surfaces are suspected to be a cause of these limitations. Here, we first present an updated overview of the current state of use of capacitive biosensors in a medical context. Then, we summarize the encountered strategies for the fabrication of capacitive biosensing surfaces. Finally, we describe the characteristics which govern the performance of the sensing surfaces, along with recent developments that were suggested to overcome their main current limitations.

Genosensors as an alternative diagnostic sensing approaches for specific detection of various certain viruses: a review of common techniques and outcomes

Viral infections are responsible for the deaths of millions of people throughout the world. Since outbreak of highly contagious and mutant viruses such as contemporary sars-cov-2 pandemic, has challenged the conventional diagnostic methods, the entity of a thoroughly sensitive, specific, rapid and inexpensive detecting technique with minimum level of false-positivity or -negativity, is desperately needed more than any time in the past decades. Biosensors as minimized devices could detect viruses in simple formats. So far, various nucleic acid, immune- and protein-based biosensors were designed and tested for recognizing the genome, antigen, or protein level of viruses, respectively; however, nucleic acid-based sensing techniques, which is the foundation of constructing genosensors, are preferred not only because of their ultra-sensitivity and applicability in the early stages of infections but also for their ability to differentiate various strains of the same virus. To date, the review articles related to genosensors are just confined to particular pathogenic diseases; In this regard, the present review covers comprehensive information of the research progress of the electrochemical, optical, and surface plasmon resonance (SPR) genosensors that applied for human viruses' diseases detection and also provides a well description of viruses' clinical importance, the conventional diagnosis approaches of viruses and their disadvantages. This review would address the limitations in the current developments as well as the future challenges involved in the successful construction of sensing approaches with the functionalized nanomaterials and also allow exploring into core-research works regarding this area.

Evolution of nucleic acids biosensors detection limit III

This review is an update of two previous ones focusing on the limit of detection of electrochemical nucleic acid biosensors allowing direct detection of nucleic acid target (miRNA, mRNA, DNA) after hybridization event. A classification founded on the nature of the electrochemical transduction pathway is established. It provides an overall picture of the detection limit evolution of the various sensor architectures developed during the last three decades and a critical report of recent strategies.

Enhancing affinity-based electroanalytical biosensors by integrated AC electrokinetic enrichment-A mini review

Biosensors play a central role in moving diagnostics to being on-site or decentralized. Affinity biosensor, an important category of biosensors, has important applications in clinical diagnosis, pharmaceuticals, immunology, and other fields. Affinity biosensors rely on specific binding between target analytes and biological ligands such as antibodies, nucleic acids, or other receptors to generate measurable signals. Oftentimes the target analytes in practical samples are of low abundance in a complex matrix. Traditional affinity biosensors mainly rely on random diffusion of analytes in solution to conjugate with biorecognition elements on the sensor surface of electrodes. The process may take hours or even days, which is not conducive to rapid and sensitive detection of biosensors. Therefore, it is strongly desired to incorporate an enrichment mechanism for target analytes into biosensor-based detection. AC electrokinetic (ACEK) effect can realize rapid enrichment of analytes by application of AC electric fields, which holds great promise for achieving high sensitivity, low detection limit, and rapid turnaround. This article reviews the studies of affinity biosensors integrated with ACEK enrichment in the past decade, and summarizes the latest detection methods, detection devices and applications, hoping to provide some insights and references for researchers in related fields.

A Sensitive and Specific Genomic RNA Sensor for Point-of-Care Screening of Zika Virus from Serum

This work presents a sensitive and specific single-step RNA sensor for Zika virus (ZIKV) in serum. Using AC electrokinetics (ACEK)-enhanced capacitive sensing technology, ZIKV genomic RNA (gRNA) can be directly detected from serum. The sensors are interdigitated electrodes modified with oligonucleotide probes complementary to the conserved regions of ZIKV gRNA. The ACEK capacitive sensing applies an optimized AC excitation signal over the sensor, which induces ACEK microfluidic enrichment of analytes and also simultaneously performs real-time monitoring of hybridization of ZIKV gRNA on the sensor surface. Hence, the sensing procedures are simple with rapid turn-around time and good specificity and sensitivity. A series of experiments are conducted to optimize the sensor performance. The performance of the sensor is investigated for three different probes, two functionalization buffers, and different hybridization buffers. With the optimized sensing protocol, this method can detect spiked ZIKV gRNA from human serum within 30 s and reach a limit of detection of 78.8 copies/μL in analytical samples and as low as 287.5 copies/μL in neat serum. The sensors can successfully differentiate between the RNAs of the ZIKV and dengue virus, two viruses with similar transmission paths and symptoms. The sensor is simple to use and requires no labeling or sophisticated process typically involved in a polymerase chain reaction, hybridization chain reaction, or nucleic acid sequence-based amplification.

Rapid and Sensitive Detection of miRNA Based on AC Electrokinetic Capacitive Sensing for Point-of-Care Applications

A sensitive and efficient method for microRNAs (miRNAs) detection is strongly desired by clinicians and, in recent years, the search for such a method has drawn much attention. There has been significant interest in using miRNA as biomarkers for multiple diseases and conditions in clinical diagnostics. Presently, most miRNA detection methods suffer from drawbacks, e.g., low sensitivity, long assay time, expensive equipment, trained personnel, or unsuitability for point-of-care. New methodologies are needed to overcome these limitations to allow rapid, sensitive, low-cost, easy-to-use, and portable methods for miRNA detection at the point of care. In this work, to overcome these shortcomings, we integrated capacitive sensing and alternating current electrokinetic effects to detect specific miRNA-16b molecules, as a model, with the limit of detection reaching 1.0 femto molar (fM) levels. The specificity of the sensor was verified by testing miRNA-25, which has the same length as miRNA-16b. The sensor we developed demonstrated significant improvements in sensitivity, response time and cost over other miRNA detection methods, and has application potential at point-of-care.

Rapid and Sensitive Point of Care Detection of MRSA Genomic DNA by Nanoelectrokinetic Sensors

Biosensors have shown great potential in realizing rapid, low cost, and portable on-site detection for diseases. This work reports the development of a new bioelectronic sensor called AC electrokinetics-based capacitive (ABC) biosensor, for the detection of genomic DNA (gDNA) of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The ABC sensor is based on interdigitated microelectrodes biofunctionalized with oligonucleotide probes. It uses a special AC signal for direct capacitive monitoring of topological change on nanostructured sensor surface, which simultaneously induces dielectrophoretic enrichment of target gDNAs. As a result, rapid and specific detection of gDNA/probe hybridization can be realized with high sensitivity. It requires no signal amplification such as labeling, hybridization chain reaction, or nucleic acid sequence-based amplification. This method involves only simple sample preparation. After optimization of nanostructured sensor surface and signal processing, the ABC sensor demonstrated fast turnaround of results (~10 s detection), excellent sensitivity (a detection limit of 4.7 DNA copies/µL MRSA gDNA), and high specificity, suitable for point of care diagnosis. As a bioelectronic sensor, the developed ABC sensors can be easily adapted for detections of other infectious agents.

A Fast and Highly Selective Nitrite Sensor Based on Interdigital Electrodes Modified With Nanogold Film and Chrome-Black T

Nitrite is a toxic substance, when excessive nitrite enters the human body, it will be seriously harmful to human. At present, the detection methods of nitrite are complicated to operate and require expensive detection instruments. Therefore, an effective, fast and highly selective nanogold film interdigital electrode sensors that can detect nitrite easily and quickly is developed in the work. Firstly, the variation of the sensitivity of nanogold film nitrite sensors with concentrations (1 mol/L, 10⁻¹ mol/L, 10⁻² mol/L, 10⁻³ mol/L, 10⁻⁴ mol/L, and 10⁻⁵ mol/L) was measured by experiments. Then, Chrome-black T was modified to the surface of the nanogold film interdigital electrodes by electrochemical polymerization, and the film of chrome-black T had affinity for nitrite ions, so nitrite ions were enriched on the sensor surface. The change law of the impedance signal of the modified nanogold film nitrite sensors after being added to different concentrations of sodium nitrite solution were also concluded. The study demonstrates that the larger the concentration of sodium nitrite solution is added to the modified interdigital electrodes, the smaller impedance and resistance of the modified interdigital electrodes are reflected. Finally, specificity of the modified interdigital electrode sensors has been demonstrated. The novel interdigital electrode sensors can detect the concentration of nitrite solution conveniently and quickly with only 30 s. Therefore, the prospect of applying the novel nanogold film interdigital electrode sensors to the detection of nitrite in blood, body fluid, food and drinking water is promising.

Simple, Fast And Highly Sensitive Detection Of Gram-Negative Bacteria By A Novel Electrical Biosensor

This work presents a rapid, low-cost, highly sensitive and specific capacitive sensor for detection of Gram negative bacteria in a field setting. Recognition of Gramnegative bacteria is based on specific detection of lipopolysaccharides (LPS) by LPS-specific aptamer probe immobilized on electrode sensors. An inhomogeneous AC electric field is applied on sensor electrodes and induces positive dielectrophoresis that attracts LPS particles to the sensor electrodes for rapid detection. The same AC signal is also used to detect the binding reactions occurred on the sensor surface. The AC signal was optimized, and the binding between LPS and the specific aptamer was demonstrated. The detection limit reaches as low as 4.9 fg/mL for free LPS molecules and 53 #/mL of bacteria within a 30s' response time, meeting the needs of onsite bacteria detection.

Rapid, highly sensitive detection of Gram-negative bacteria with lipopolysaccharide based disposable aptasensor

Gram-negative bacteria are one of the most common microorganisms in the environment. Their differential detection and recognition from Gram-positive bacteria has been attracting much attention over the years. Using Escherichia coli (E. coli) as a model, we demonstrated on-site detection of Gram-negative bacteria by an AC electrokinetics-based capacitive sensing method using commercial microelectrodes functionalized with an aptamer specific to lipopolysaccharides. Dielectrophoresis effect was utilized to enrich viable bacteria to the microelectrodes rapidly, achieving a detection limit of 10² cells/mL within a 30 s' response time. The sensor showed a negligible response to Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), a Gram-positive species. The developed sensor showed significant advantages in sensitivity, selectivity, cost, operation simplicity, and response time. Therefore, this sensing method has shown great application potential for environmental monitoring, food safety, and real-time diagnosis.

Highly sensitive and specific on-site detection of serum cocaine by a low cost aptasensor

Cocaine is one of the most used illegal recreational drugs. Developing an on-site test for cocaine use detection has been a focus of research effort, since it is essential to the control and legal action against drug abuse. Currently most of cocaine detection methods are time-consuming and require special or expensive equipment, and the detection often suffers from high cross-reactivity with cocaine metabolites and relative low sensitivity with the best limit of detection reported at sub nanomolar (nM) level. In this work, an aptasensor has been developed using capacitive monitoring of sensor surface incorporating alternating current electrokinetics effects to speed up molecular transport and minimize matrix effects. The aptasensor is rapid, low cost, highly sensitive and specific as well as simple-to-use for the detection of cocaine from serum. The assay has a sample-to-result time of 30 s, a limit of detection of 7.8 fM, and a linear response for cocaine ranging from 14.5fM to 14.5pM in standard buffer, which are great improvements from other reported cocaine sensors. Special buffer is used for serum cocaine detection, and a limit of detection of 13.4 fM is experimentally demonstrated for cocaine spiked in human serum (equivalent to 1.34pM cocaine in neat serum). The specificity of the biosensor is also demonstrated with structurally similar chemicals, ecgonine ethyl ester and methylecgonidine. This biosensor shows high promise in detection of low levels of cocaine from complex matrices.