Biofuel Cell Based Self-Powered Sensing Platform for l-Cysteine Detection

Abstract

L-cysteine (L-Cys) detection is of great importance because of its crucial roles in physiological and clinical diagnoses. In this study, a glucose/O2 biofuel cell (BFC) was assembled by using flavin adenine dinucleotide-dependent glucose dehydrogenase (FAD-GDH)-based bioanode and laccase-based biocathode. Interestingly, the open circuit potential (OCP) of the BFC could be inhibited by Cu(2+) and subsequently activated by L-Cys, by which a BFC-based self-powered sensing platform for the detection of L-Cys was proposed. The FAD-GDH activity can be inhibited by Cu(2+) and, in turn, subsequent reversible activation by L-Cys because of the binding preference of L-Cys toward Cu(2+) by forming the Cu-S bond. The preferential interaction between L-Cys and Cu(2+) facilitated Cu(2+) to remove from the surface of the bioanode, and thus, the OCP of the system could be turned on. Under optimized conditions, the OCP of the BFC was systematically increased upon the addition of the L-Cys. The OCP increment (ΔOCP) was linear with the concentration of L-Cys within 20 nM to 3 μM. The proposed sensor exhibited lower detection limit of 10 nM L-Cys (S/N = 3), which is significantly lower than those values for other methods reported so far. Other amino acids and glutathione did not affect L-Cys detection. Therefore, this developed approach is sensitive, facile, cost-effective, and environmental-friendly, and could be very promising for the reliable clinically detecting of L-Cys. This work would trigger the interest of developing BFCs based self-powered sensors for practical applications.

Ultrasensitive Bioaffinity Electrochemical Sensors: Advances and New Perspectives

“…Recently, biofuel cells (BFCs) based self-powered sensors have attracted considerable attention because they can work without external power source, are wellsuited for device miniaturization and promising applications as implantable power sources [83]. The sensing mechanism is based on the fact that some parameters of the BFCs, such as the power density and open circuit 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 potential (OCP), are subordinate to the concentration of the analytes [84]. Gai et al proposed an ultrasensitive selfpowered aptasensor based on enzyme biofuel cell and DNA bioconjugate for antibiotic residue detection [85].…”

Recent Progress on the Development of Biofuel Cells for Self‐Powered Electrochemical Biosensing and Logic Biosensing: A Review

“…Later, Liu’s group followed the “indirect approach” and proposed a self‐powered dual‐step L‐cysteine biosensor based on a glucose/O 2 BFC (Figure 11B). The BFC is constructed by using FAD‐GDH‐based bioanode and laccase‐based biocathode, for efficient electron transport, menadione (VK3) and 2,2’‐azinobis(3‐ethylbenzothiazoline‐6‐sulfonic acid) (ABTS) were adopted as mediators 39. The VK3 and ABTS can dramatically increase the open circuit potential by decreasing the overpotential of the glucose oxidation at the bioanode and the O 2 reduction at the biocathode, respectively.…”

Recent Advances in the Construction of Biofuel Cells Based Self‐powered Electrochemical Biosensors: A Review

“…Based on such principle, enzyme effect based BFCs based biosensors were reported . In the presence of enzyme inhibitors, the enzymes activity would be reduced; accordingly, the power output of the BFCs decreased, leading to some self‐powered BFCs based on inhibition effect . The blocking effect is widely found in the traditional electrochemical DNA, aptamer or immuno‐bioaffinity biosensors when the presence of targets lead to the dramatically changed electron transfer rate on the electrochemical interface.…”