Use of whole-cell bioreporters to assess bioavailability of contaminants in aquatic systems

Abstract

Water contamination has become increasingly a critical global environmental issue that threatens human and ecosystems’ health. Monitoring and risk assessment of toxic pollutants in water bodies is essential to identifying water pollution treatment needs. Compared with the traditional monitoring approaches, environmental biosensing via whole-cell bioreporters (WCBs) has exhibited excellent capabilities for detecting bioavailability of multiple pollutants by providing a fast, simple, versatile and economical way for environmental risk assessment. The performance of WCBs is determined by its elements of construction, such as host strain, regulatory and reporter genes, as well as experimental conditions. Previously, numerous studies have focused on the design and construction of WCB rather than improving the detection process and commercialization of this technology. For investigators working in the environmental field, WCB can be used to detect pollutants is more important than how they are constructed. This work provides a review of the development of WCBs and a brief introduction to genetic construction strategies and aims to summarize key studies on the application of WCB technology in detection of water contaminants, including organic pollutants and heavy metals. In addition, the current status of commercialization of WCBs is highlighted.

Pandemic COVID-19 ends but soil pollution increases: Impacts and a new approach for risk assessment

“…In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the use of whole-cell biosensors to assess the bioavailability and toxicity of contaminants in the environment ( Zhang et al, 2020 ; Zhang et al, 2022 ; Zhu et al, 2022 ), which promises a streamlined approach for environmental risk assessment. Whole-cell biosensors are genetically modified prokaryotic or eukaryotic cells that function as sensor for hazardous substances and environmental pollutants ( Li et al, 2022 ; Zhang et al, 2017 ).…”

“…Biosensors that give a dose-dependent signal based on the bioavailability of a specific pollutant are called Class I biosensors, those that output a signal based on the stress caused by pollutants are called Class II biosensors, and those that exhibit a non-specific reduction in signal output due to the toxicity of a pollutant are called Class III biosensors ( Fig. 2 , Zhang et al, 2021 ; Zhu et al, 2022 ).

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Optical Biosensors and Their Applications for the Detection of Water Pollutants

“…WBCs have been shown to have excellent suitability for use in biosensors for water monitoring. Class I are the most widely employed for the detection of contaminants in water, although Class II and III have also been used to a lesser extent [ 39 ].…”

Kinetics of metal detection by luminescence-based whole-cell biosensors: connecting biosensor response to metal bioavailability, speciation and cell metabolism

“…21,23 Due to this complexity, the exploitation of bioluminescence cell signals remains essentially limited so far to (i) mere consideration of the only maximal signal amplitude without mechanistic analysis of the signal dependence on time, (ii) the recourse to calibration measurements for converting bioluminescence into bulk concentration of free metal estimated by thermodynamic speciation computations within restrictive equilibrium BLM framework, or (iii) empirical fitting of time-dependent bioluminescence data collected for different metal contents in solution. 20,24–26…”

“…21,23 Due to this complexity, the exploitation of bioluminescence cell signals remains essentially limited so far to (i) mere consideration of the only maximal signal amplitude without mechanistic analysis of the signal dependence on time, (ii) the recourse to calibration measurements for converting bioluminescence into bulk concentration of free metal estimated by thermodynamic speciation computations within restrictive equilibrium BLM framework, or (iii) empirical fitting of timedependent bioluminescence data collected for different metal contents in solution. 20,[24][25][26] In view of the above elements, force is to recognize the lack of a comprehensive theory for a full exploitation of the time-response of luminescent metal biosensors and the evaluation of metal bioavailability properties beyond the limits of equilibrium BLM. Accordingly, we extend herein our recent model on bioluminescence emission by metal biosensors 22 to cases where media contain metal-binding ligands and metal may be depleted from bulk solution in the course of time.…”