Selective Detection of Lysozyme Biomarker Utilizing Large Area Chemical Vapor Deposition-Grown Graphene-Based Field-Effect Transistor

Abstract

Selective and rapid detection of biomarkers is of utmost importance in modern day health care for early stage diagnosis to prevent fatal diseases and infections. Among several protein biomarkers, the role of lysozyme has been found to be especially important in human immune system to prevent several bacterial infections and other chronic disease such as bronchopulmonary dysplasia. Thus, real-time monitoring of lysozyme concentration in a human body can pave a facile route for early warning for potential bacterial infections. Here, we present for the first time a label-free lysozyme protein sensor that is rapid and selective based on a graphene field-effect transistor (GFET) functionalized with selectively designed single-stranded probe DNA (pDNA) with high binding affinity toward lysozyme molecules. When the target lysozyme molecules bind to the surface-immobilized pDNAs, the resulting shift of the charge neutrality points of the GFET device, also known as the Dirac voltage, varied systematically with the concentration of target lysozyme molecules. The experimental results show that the GFET-based biosensor is capable of detecting lysozyme molecules in the concentration range from 10 nM to 1 µM.

Graphene and Graphene‐Based Materials in Biomedical Science

“…Ultrasensitive flexible FET‐type aptasensor has been developed for the detection of CA 125 cancer marker, which is based on carboxylated multiwalled carbon nanotubes which are immobilized onto reduced graphene oxide film . Graphene‐based FET has been recently reported for the sensitive and selective detection of lysozyme protein biomarker which can be applied in the fabrication of point‐of‐care devices . Palladium nanoflower which has been decorated with graphene has been used for the FET based detection of glucose in the presence of glucose oxidase (GOx) .…”

Lab-on-a-Chip Systems for Aptamer-Based Biosensing

“…Field-effect transistors (FETs) have attracted much attention in the biosensing community as they offer many advantages such as miniaturization, low-cost, large-scale integration capability with the existing manufacturing process as well as label-free, rapid detection and highly sensitive detection of analytes [25]. A typical FET biosensor is composed of a semiconducting channel that connects the source and the drain electrodes.…”

“…Among several 2D materials, graphene has been the most widely used as a promising FET channel material due to its superior physical, chemical, electronic properties as well as its ability to be grown in large areas with high fidelity. For example, a graphene field-effect transistor (GFET) has been employed as a biosensor for detecting DNA [62], triphosphate [63], bacteria, and viruses [64,65] as well as protein biomarkers [25,66]. Integrating a GFET biosensor with a microfluidic device can produce synergistic effect from their respective advantages, further enhancing its sensing performances.…”

“…Because of these advantages, aptamers are often used as an integral part of biosensors leading to the creation of the term aptasensors to describe aptamer-based biosensors. There are different classifications of aptasensors depending on the type of transduction mechanisms employed such as mass-based (i.e., quartz crystal microbalance (QCM)) [6,7], electrochemical (amperometric, voltammetry, impedimetric) [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18], optical [19][20][21][22][23] or field-effect transistor (FET)-based methods [24][25][26].…”

Characterizing the noncovalent binding behavior of tartrazine to lysozyme: A combined spectroscopic and computational analysis

“…Due to the potential toxicity of azo dyes, Food and Agricultural Organizations and the World Health Organization have strict regulations on the use of such synthetic azo dyes as food colorants. Some studies have indicated that the abnormal lysozyme levels are related to a variety of diseases such as bronchopulmonary dysplasia, diarrheal disease, conjunctivitis, and nephropathy . Nevertheless, there is a very limited study about the toxicity of tartrazine targeting the lysozyme.…”