Luminol-labeled gold nanoparticles for ultrasensitive chemiluminescence-based chemical analyses

Low-Triggering-Potential Electrochemiluminescence from a Luminol Analogue Functionalized Semiconducting Polymer Dots for Imaging Detection of Blood Glucose

In recent years, semiconducting polymer dots (Pdots) as environmentally friendly and high-brightness electrochemiluminescence (ECL) nanoemitters have attracted intense attention in ECL biosensing and imaging. However, most of the available Pdots have a high ECL excitation potential in the aqueous phase (>1.0 V vs Ag/AgCl), which causes poor selectivity in actual sample detection. Therefore, it is particularly important to construct a simple and universal strategy to lower the trigger potential of Pdots. This work has realized the ECL emission of Pdots at low-trigger-potential based on the electrochemiluminescence resonance energy transfer (ERET) strategy. By covalently coupling the Pdots with a luminol analogue, N-(4-aminobutyl)-N-ethylisoluminol (ABEI), the ABEI-Pdots showed an anodic ECL emission with a low onset potential of +0.34 V and a peak potential at +0.45 V (vs Ag/AgCl), which was the lowest trigger potential reported so far. We further explored this low-triggering-potential ECL for imaging detection of glucose in buffer and serum. By imaging the ABEI-Pdots-modified screen-printed electrodes (SPCE) at +0.45 V for 16 s, the ECL imaging method could quantify the glucose concentration in buffer from 10 to 200 μM with detection limits of 3.3 μM, while exhibiting excellent selectivity. When applied to real serum, the results of our method were highly consistent with a commercial blood glucose meter, with the relative errors ranging from 3.2 to 13%. This work provided a universal strategy for constructing low potential Pdots and demonstrated its application potential in complex biological sample analysis.

Integration of 3D Hydrodynamic Focused Microreactor with Microfluidic Chemiluminescence Sensing for Online Synthesis and Catalytical Characterization of Gold Nanoparticles

Chemiluminescence assays have shown great advantages compared with other optical techniques. Gold nanoparticles have drawn much attention in chemiluminescence analysis systems as an enzyme-free catalyst. The catalytic activity of gold nanoparticles for chemiluminescence sensing depends on size, shape and the surface charge property, which is hard to characterize in batches. As there is no positive or negative correlation between chemiluminescence signals and sizes of gold nanoparticles, the best way to get optimal gold nanoparticles is to control the reaction conditions via online chemiluminescence sensing systems. Therefore, a new method was developed for online synthesis of gold nanoparticles with a three-dimension hydrodynamic focusing microreactor, directly coupled with a microfluidic chemiluminescence sensing chip, which was coupled to a charge-coupled device camera for direct catalytical characterization of gold nanoparticles. All operations were performed in an automatic way with a program controlled by Matlab. Gold nanoparticles were synthesized through a single-phase reaction using glucose as a reducing agent and stabilizer at room temperature. The property of gold nanoparticles was easily controlled with the three-dimension microreactor during synthesis. The catalyst property of synthesized gold nanoparticles was characterized in a luminol-NaOCl chemiluminescence system. After optimizing parameters of synthesis, the chemiluminescence signal was enhanced to a factor of 171. The gold nanoparticles synthesized under optimal conditions for the luminol-NaOCl system were stable for at least one month. To further investigate the catalytic activity of synthesized gold nanoparticles in various situations, two methods were used to change the property of gold nanoparticles. After adding a certain amount of salt (NaCl), gold nanoparticles aggregated with a changed surface charge property and the catalytic activity was greatly enhanced. Glutathione was used as an example of molecules with thiol groups which interact with gold nanoparticles and reduce the catalytic activity. The chemiluminescence intensity was reduced by 98.9%. Therefore, we could show that using a microreactor for gold nanoparticles synthesis and direct coupling with microfluidic chemiluminescence sensing offers a promising monitoring method to find the best synthesis condition of gold nanoparticles for catalytic activity.

Cobalt(ii)-8-hydroxyquinoline-5-sulfonic acid complex/N-(4-aminobutyl)-N-ethylisoluminol/reduced graphene hybrids as nanocatalytic reaction platforms for chemiluminescence

The as-prepared Co^II(HQS)₂/ABEI/rGO hybrids exhibited excellent CL activity when reacted with hydrogen peroxide, the dissolved oxygen and periodate in alkaline solution.

Gold Triangular Nanoprisms and Nanodecahedra: Synthesis and Interaction Studies with Luminol toward Biosensor Applications

Gold triangular nanoprisms and nanodecahedra (pentagonal bipyramids) were synthesized in the absence and presence of nanoseeds by a simple solvothermal synthesis through the reduction of Auric Chloride (HAuCl₄) with poly(vinylpyrrolidone) (PVP) in N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF), respectively. These gold nanoparticles exhibit two plasmon resonance bands. The interaction of these gold nanoparticles with luminol was investigated using UV-vis and fluorescence spectroscopy since hefty number of environmental and biological sensors are based on the combination of luminol and gold nanoparticles. The gold nanoparticles quenches the fluorescence of luminol through a static quenching mechanism, i.e., ground state complex formation, which was confirmed by both absorption spectroscopy as well as time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy. The Stern-Volmer quenching constant and the effective quenching constant determine that gold nanodecahedra has more interaction with luminol than that of triangular gold nanoprisms. The distance between the gold nanoparticles and luminol, calculated using FRET theory, is less than 8 nm, which indicates efficient energy transfer during interaction. These results are expected to be useful for the development of novel sensors.

Recent Advances on Luminescent Enhancement-Based Porous Silicon Biosensors

Luminescence-based detection paradigms have key advantages over other optical platforms such as absorbance, reflectance or interferometric based detection. However, autofluorescence, low quantum yield and lack of photostability of the fluorophore or emitting molecule are still performance-limiting factors. Recent research has shown the need for enhanced luminescence-based detection to overcome these drawbacks while at the same time improving the sensitivity, selectivity and reducing the detection limits of optical sensors and biosensors. Nanostructures have been reported to significantly improve the spectral properties of the emitting molecules. These structures offer unique electrical, optic and magnetic properties which may be used to tailor the surrounding electrical field of the emitter. Here, the main principles behind luminescence and luminescence enhancement-based detections are reviewed, with an emphasis on europium complexes as the emitting molecule. An overview of the optical porous silicon microcavity (pSiMC) as a biosensing platform and recent proof-of-concept examples on enhanced luminescence-based detection using pSiMCs are provided and discussed.