Quantum cytosensor for early detection of cancer

Abstract

Current use of graphene quantum dot for cancer detection is highly impeded by the low Raman cross‐section and used as a carrier for plasmonic materials. Hence, there is a need for a sensor an efficient Raman cross‐section, with maintaining the cellular homeostasis to attain accurate detection. Here, we report a SERS‐activated graphene oxide (GO) quantum Cytosensor for whole cell cancer detection capable for the early detection of cancer down to a single cellular level. On approaching quantum scale, we achieved SERS activation of GO quantum dots by introducing the functionality of quantum confinement. By altering the density of functional groups on the surface, we facilitated accelerated self‐cellular uptake resulting in increased SERS sensitivity. Here, we demonstrate cancer detection by two approaches: biomarker detection in external environment and intracellular detection using three cell lines. The quantum Cytosensor advances cancer detection to the molecular level by sensing the complex biomolecular processes transpiring intracellularly to detect and differentiate cancerous attributes of a cell. We observed a 3000‐, 2500‐ and 3500‐fold increase in enhancement of DNA, RNA and protein, respectively. Discernment of SERS spectral signatures was obtained by employing machine learning techniques which primarily identified the differences between cancer cells and normal cells. The classification and clustering techniques provided a high diagnostic sensitivity and specificity of 84.83% with unparalleled accuracy of 92.3%. Detection of cancer down to a single cellular level using quantum Cytosensor via SERS integrated with machine learning provides a new stepping stone towards adoption of SERS‐based early detection of cancer.

Viral filtration using carbon‐based materials

“…Efforts on the next generation of antivirals have been focused on nanomaterials, particularly metallic nanoparticles (Ganesh, Venkatakrishnan, & Tan, 2019; Kanematsu et al., 2019; Ray et al., 2018; Reddy et al., 2018). Carbon‐based nanomaterials, such as graphene and graphene oxide, hold distinctive characteristics that have attracted significant attention in a variety of applications.…”

Quantum Scale Plasmonic Material for Biomedical Applications

“…ASPC-1 and NIH3T3 cells were cultured in a similar manner, as explained earlier [160], [161]. H 69 cells were also cultured in T25 tissue culture flask, and the same protocol was followed, as explained by [162]. The cells were divided in the ratio of 1:4 on reaching the 80% confluence.…”

“…The cells were treated with quantum sensors for 24 hours. Further protocol was followed as described [162].…”

“…The cells were seeded with the gold probes with a complete growth medium for 24 hours. The treatment was stopped by removing the complete growth medium followed by the procedure explained [160], [162]. All the tests were achieved four times.…”

“…The PCA method provides an efficient way to represent the difference between the different cell types which are otherwise not significantly distinct from the raw SERS spectra. Later attaining the principal components (PC) the statistically different (P< 0.05) PCs were determined using a t-test [162].…”