Single Cell Electrochemiluminescence Imaging: From the Proof-of-Concept to Disposable Device-Based Analysis

Abstract

We report here the development of coreactant-based electrogenerated chemiluminescence (ECL) as a surface-confined microscopy to image single cells and their membrane proteins. Labeling the entire cell membrane allows one to demonstrate that, by contrast with fluorescence, ECL emission is only detected from fluorophores located in the immediate vicinity of the electrode surface (i.e., 1-2 μm). Then, to present the potential diagnostic applications of our approach, we selected carbon nanotubes (CNT)-based inkjet-printed disposable electrodes for the direct ECL imaging of a labeled plasma receptor overexpressed on tumor cells. The ECL fluorophore was linked to an antibody and enabled to localize the ECL generation on the cancer cell membrane in close proximity to the electrode surface. Such a result is intrinsically associated with the unique ECL mechanism and is rationalized by considering the limited lifetimes of the electrogenerated coreactant radicals. The electrochemical stimulus used for luminescence generation does not suffer from background signals, such as the typical autofluorescence of biological samples. The presented surface-confined ECL microscopy should find promising applications in ultrasensitive single cell imaging assays.

Disposable Biosensor Based on Amidase/CeO2/GNR Modified Inkjet‐printed CNT Electrodes‐droplet Based Paracetamol Detection in Biological Fluids for “Point‐of‐care” Applications

“…Furthermore, IJP allows facile prototyping by using easily changeable layouts in the digital pattern files and up‐scalability from prototype to industrial level. Our approach for the inkjet‐printed sensor construction showed remarkable results in the field of electrochemical disposable devices .…”

Towards Determining Kinetics of Annihilation Electrogenerated Chemiluminescence by Concentration-Dependent Luminescent Intensity

“…We employed two-dimensional numerical finite element calculations (COMSOL) to determine the concentration profiles of all involved species, A, A + , A − , A * along the inter-electrode distance (see Supporting Information for simulation details as well as Refs. [16,20]). We simulated a geometry of two 20-µm-long electrodes forming a nanochannel which is diffusively coupled on both sides to a reservoir of a constant concentration of species A.…”

Electrochemical imaging of cells and tissues

“…2d ). 33 Ultrasensitive single cell imaging assays for cancer diagnostics are envisaged. However, the diffusion length of the electro-generated co-reactant species tri- n -propylamine radical ion (TPrA + ˙) and tri- n -propylamine radical (TPrA˙) is limited to 1–2 μm, which is shorter than the dimension of a whole cell surface restricting the detection to the portion of the cell-electrode boundary.…”