Quadruple UV LED Array for Facile, Portable, and Online Intrinsic Fluorescent Imaging of Protein in a Whole Gel Electrophoresis Chip

Abstract

Intrinsic fluorescence imaging (IFI) has been used for the stain-free detection of proteins in slab gel. However, complicated detection setups and small irradiation area limited the development of facile, online, and portable imaging of the whole slab gel. We here designed a quadruple UV LED array to produce even and powerful area light for direct irradiation of gel electrophoresis chip (GEC) at 275 nm. In addition, we only used a filter of 365 nm, a UV camera lens, and a CCD for IFI detection. We integrated the simple detection setup with the small GEC to construct the IFI-GEC device with a portable size of 15 × 15 × 38 cm. We detected three model proteins to demonstrate the good evenness of the LED array and the online imaging of the whole GEC. Furthermore, the reproducible IFI-GEC detection was completed within 10 min and the LOD was as low as 40 ng for lysozyme detection. All results indicated the potential of the IFI-GEC device for online and portable detection of proteins without staining.

A Portable Array Visualization Device Integrating Sample Preparation and Detection All-in-One for the On-Site Analysis of Complex Samples

“…Cao et al integrated intrinsic fluorescence imaging (IFI) with a gel electrophoresis chip (GEC) to construct the IFI-GEC device. The reproducible IFI-GEC detection could be completed within 10 min, and the detection limit was as low as 40 ng for lysozyme detection . Wang et al designed a smartphone optical device for point-of-care testing (POCT) of glucose and cholesterol in metabolic syndrome patients using a ratiometric fluorescent sensor, with both detection limits of 10 μmol/L.…”