A label-free fluorescent molecular beacon based on DNA-Ag nanoclusters for the construction of versatile Biosensors

Label-free fluorometric detection of chymotrypsin activity using graphene oxide/nucleic-acid-stabilized silver nanoclusters hybrid materials

Pancreatic function tests are used to determine the presence of chronic pancreatitis, particularly in the early stage of the disease. Chymotrypsin is an indicator of pancreatic function and is thus related to pancreatic diseases. A new fluorescent biosensing method for assay of chymotrypsin activity was developed using DNA (dC₁₂)-templated silver nanoclusters and graphene oxide (GO). A peptide probe was also designed using chymotrypsin-cleavable amino acid sequence and a cysteine terminus. The peptide probe formed Ag-S bond to dC₁₂-AgNCs to enhance the fluorescence of dC₁₂-AgNCs. After the addition of GO, the peptide was adsorbed to the negative GO surface and the fluorescence of dC₁₂-AgNCs was quenched by FRET. The peptide was then degraded into amino acid fragments upon addition of chymotrypsin; these fragments were released from the GO surface, and the FRET was terminated. The developed label-free method features lower cost and higher sensitivity to chymotrypsin activity assay compared with conventional fluorescence analysis. The method can be used to analyze chymotrypsin (as low as 3ng/mL, signal/noise =3) across a dynamic range of 0.0-50.0ng/mL. The proposed biosensing strategy can also be extended to other proteases by using different peptide substrates.

Cascaded multiple amplification strategy for ultrasensitive detection of HIV/HCV virus DNA

Ultrasensitive detection of HIV and HCV virus DNA is of great importance for early accurate diagnostics and therapy of HIV virus-infected patients. Herein, to our best knowledge, it is the first to use DNA cascaded multiple amplification strategy for ultrasensitive detection of HIV virus DNA with G-quadruplex-specific fluorescent or colorimetric probes as signal carriers. The developed strategy also exhibited universal applicability for HCV virus DNA detection. After reaction for about 4h, high sensitivity and specificity can be achieved at both fluorescent and colorimetric strategies (limit of detection (LOD) of 10 fM and 0.5pM were reached for fluorescent and colorimetric detection, respectively). And the single-based mismatched DNA even can be distinguished by naked eyes. It is believed that the cascaded multiple amplification strategy presents a huge advance in sensing platform and potential application in future clinical diagnosis.