Recent Advances on Diatom-Based Biosensors

Abstract

Porous materials showing some useful transducing features, i.e., any changes in their physical or chemical properties as a consequence of molecular interaction, are very attractive in the realization of sensors and biosensors. Diatom frustules have been gaining support for biosensors since they are made of nanostructured amorphous silica, but do not require any nano-fabrication step; their surface can be easily functionalized and customized for specific application; diatom frustules are photoluminescent, and they can be found in almost every pond of water on the Earth, thus assuring large and low-cost availability. In this review, the most recent advances in diatom-based biosensors are reported, and a perspective view on future developments is given.

Computational analysis of the effects of nitrogen source and sin1 knockout on biosilica morphology in the model diatom Thalassiosira pseudonana

“…The intricate and highly regular, hierarchical porous patterns of diatom biosilica are regarded as paradigms for the bottom-up synthesis of mineral based materials under environmentally benign conditions [2][3][4]. Furthermore, diatom biosilica microparticles have interesting materials properties that can be exploited for a wide range of applications in photonics, chemical sensing, catalysis and drug delivery [5][6][7][8]. The diatom cell wall consists of two halves of identical structures that are arranged in a petri-dish like arrangement.…”

Nanostructured Biosilica of Diatoms: From Water World to Biomedical Applications

“…Surprisingly, diatoms are a cheaper and more accessible alternative material, whose ordered pore distribution bears a resemblance to a photonic crystal. A photonic crystal is a spatial, periodic distribution of refractive index, through which light cannot propagate in specific ranges [63]. The use of diatoms as plasmonic substrates and their combination with metal plasmonic structures resulted in an alternative to photolithography fabrication of cost-effective SERS substrates [1,61,[64][65][66].…”

Diatom Biosilica in Targeted Drug Delivery and Biosensing Applications: Recent Studies

“…Indeed, several excellent reviews addressing the subjects prior to our selected timeframe are available to the reader [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]24]. More recently, other authors have also discussed different aspects of the fields in terms, e.g., of the applications of diatoms or microalgae in bio-sensing and -technology [18,[32][33][34], the discovery of active compounds [35][36][37], surface chemistry [38], material science [39][40][41] and as drug carries [42][43][44]. We begin with a short overview of the diatoms' structure and we then move specifically to the use of diatoms for the targeted delivery of anticancer and antibiotic drugs, and how the same microalgae are employed in the fabrications of biosensors whose analyte signal response is evaluated via fluorescence and surface-enhanced Raman scattering techniques.…”