Nguyen Duy-Khiem, Jang Chang-Hyun
Department of Chemistry, Gachon University, Seongnam-daero 1342, Sujeong-gu, Seongnam-si 13120, Gyeonggi-do, Korea.
Micromachines (Basel). 2022 Mar 21;13(3):490. doi: 10.3390/mi13030490.
In this study, we developed a liquid crystal (LC) droplet-based sensing platform for the detection of carboxylesterase (CES) and its inhibitors. The LC droplet patterns in contact with myristoylcholine chloride (Myr) exhibited dark cross appearances, corresponding to homeotropic anchoring of the LCs at the aqueous/LC interface. However, in the presence of CES, Myr was hydrolyzed; therefore, the optical images of the LC patterns changed to bright fan-shaped textures, corresponding to a planar orientation of LCs at the interface. In contrast, the presence of CES inhibitors, such as benzil, inhibits the hydrolysis of Myr; as a result, the LC patterns exhibit dark cross textures. This principle led to the development of an LC droplet-based sensing method with a detection limit of 2.8 U/L and 10 μM, for CES detection and its inhibitor, respectively. The developed biosensor not only enables simple and label-free detection of CES but also shows high promise for the detection of CES inhibitors.
在本研究中，我们开发了一种基于液晶（LC）液滴的传感平台，用于检测羧酸酯酶（CES）及其抑制剂。与氯化肉豆蔻酰胆碱（Myr）接触的LC液滴图案呈现出暗十字外观，这对应于LC在水/LC界面处的垂直取向锚定。然而，在CES存在的情况下，Myr被水解；因此，LC图案的光学图像变为明亮的扇形纹理，这对应于LC在界面处的平面取向。相比之下，CES抑制剂（如联苯甲酰）的存在会抑制Myr的水解；结果，LC图案呈现出暗十字纹理。这一原理导致开发出一种基于LC液滴的传感方法，其对CES检测和其抑制剂的检测限分别为2.8 U/L和10 μM。所开发的生物传感器不仅能够对CES进行简单且无标记的检测，而且在检测CES抑制剂方面也显示出很高的前景。
