Molecularly Imprinted Photonic Polymers as Sensing Elements for the Creation of Cross‐Reactive Sensor Arrays

Abstract

By combining molecular imprinting and colloidal crystal templating, molecularly imprinted inverse-opal photonic polymers (MIPPs) acting as sensing elements have been exploited to create sensor arrays for the first time. With this new strategy, abundant sensing elements with differential sensing abilities were easily accessible. Because of the unique hierarchical porous structure integrated in each sensing element, high sensitivity and selectivity, fast response and self-reporting (label-free) detection could be simultaneously achieved. All these fascinating features indicate that MIPPs are ideal sensing elements for creating sensor arrays. By integrating the individual sensing elements on a substrate, the formed array chip delivers better portability and high-throughput capability. As a demonstration, six kinds of contaminants were selected as analytes. The detection and discrimination of these analytes and even their mixtures in a wide range of concentrations, particularly trace amounts of analyte against a high background of other components, could be achieved, indicating the powerful capability of MIPPs-based sensor array for sensing. These results suggest that the described strategy opens a new route for sensor array creation and should find important applications in a wide range of areas.

A colloidoscope of colloid-based porous materials and their uses

“…In addition, CBPM sensors can be structurally patterned in order to obtain an explicit visual readout 260 ( Figure 17A and B) or be molecularly imprinted to target specific molecules. [261][262][263][264][265][266] The high surface area inherent to CBPM can lead to higher analyte-surface interactions with advantageous signal-to-noise ratios. Furthermore, the presence of macropores and stimuliresponsiveness allows the use of CBPM superparticles for multiple functions, for example to combine optical reporting with self-monitored drug release.…”

“…In the next step, the template molecule is removed, exposing a highly selective recognition site. Using this method, highly sensitive and selective label-free colorimetric assays were demonstrated for applications such as amino-acid chiral recognition, 266 as well as detection of vanillin, 315 various antibiotics, 262 and toxins 263 at sub-micromolar concentrations. Incorporation of multiple elements in a single CBPM sensor can result in multiresponsiveness, multiple reporting mechanisms, and multi-functionality.…”

“…324 Multi-analyte cross-reactive arrays combining CBPM elements, for example based on molecularly imprinted hydrogels, can be used for colorimetric detection of trace amounts of toxins and pollutants in complex mixtures even with high background signal from the other components. 263, 324 An array sensitive to brominated flame-retardants, commonly used as additives in consumer products, is shown in Figure 21. 324 Monitoring of brominated flame-retardants at low levels normally requires relatively complex chromatographic analyses.…”

Molecularly imprinted polymers as recognition materials for electronic tongues

“…A much better defined and more sensitive array of macroporous AA/EGDMA films was patterned by using a colloidal crystal of silica microspheres as templates ( Fig. 4a) (Xu et al 2014a). The PCA plot (Fig.…”

A Behavior‐Learned Cross‐Reactive Sensor Matrix for Intelligent Skin Perception

“…[ 12–18 ] These cross‐reactive sensory systems, inspired by mammalian olfactory and gustatory systems, can simultaneously detect and identify specific responses from a variety of non‐specific vapor, liquid elements, and their combinations by analyzing the difference in sensing responses with pattern recognition and machine learning algorithms. [ 19–27 ] Although these previous advances are noteworthy, it is still rather problematic to fully translate the cross‐reactive system into artificially perceptive electronics at this initial stage, possibly due to the lack of facile device architectures and appropriate protocols. More importantly, since most of the current e‐skin technologies are essentially based on “lock and key” approaches, the numeric data signals measured from the superposed stimuli could not be cross‐operated with each other, leaving the difficulty of decoupling interference of intermixed signals and of integrating cross interferences for recognizing the behavior of each stimulus.…”