Issue 14, 2016

Glycan heterogeneity on gold nanoparticles increases lectin discrimination capacity in label-free multiplexed bioassays

Abstract

The development of new analytical tools as point-of-care biosensors is crucial to combat the spread of infectious diseases, especially in the context of drug-resistant organisms, or to detect biological warfare agents. Glycan/lectin interactions drive a wide range of recognition and signal transduction processes within nature and are often the first site of adhesion/recognition during infection making them appealing targets for biosensors. Glycosylated gold nanoparticles have been developed that change colour from red to blue upon interaction with carbohydrate-binding proteins and may find use as biosensors, but are limited by the inherent promiscuity of some of these interactions. Here we mimic the natural heterogeneity of cell-surface glycans by displaying mixed monolayers of glycans on the surface of gold nanoparticles. These are then used in a multiplexed, label-free bioassay to create ‘barcodes’ which describe the lectin based on its binding profile. The increased information content encoded by using complex mixtures of a few sugars, rather than increased numbers of different sugars makes this approach both scalable and accessible. These nanoparticles show increased lectin identification power at a range of lectin concentrations, relative to single-channel sensors. It was also found that some information about the concentration of the lectins can be extracted, all from just a simple colour change, taking this technology closer to being a realistic biosensor.

Graphical abstract: Glycan heterogeneity on gold nanoparticles increases lectin discrimination capacity in label-free multiplexed bioassays

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
07 Mar 2016
Accepted
06 May 2016
First published
09 May 2016
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Analyst, 2016,141, 4305-4312

Glycan heterogeneity on gold nanoparticles increases lectin discrimination capacity in label-free multiplexed bioassays

L. Otten, D. Vlachou, S. Richards and M. I. Gibson, Analyst, 2016, 141, 4305 DOI: 10.1039/C6AN00549G

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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