Biosensor: Prospects andapplications= Biosensor: triển vọng và ứng dụng

Tap chi Cong nghe Sinh hqc 11(4): 603-611, 2013

REVIEW

BIOSENSOR: PROSPECTS AND APPLICATIONS

Bui Van Ngoc, Nghiem Ngoc M inh

Institute o f Biotechnology, Vietnam Academy o f Science and Technology

SUM M ARY

In this review we discuss the design, construction, and development of biosensors depending on their

applications to many specific analytical purposes in agriculture, food industry, pharmaceutical industry, and

environmental monitoring. Biosensor could be composed of DNA, enzyme, protein, prokaryotic or eukaryotic

cells. However, eukaryotic cells e.g. yeast cells are the most suitable microorganisms to develop biosensor.

Since yeast cells are so easy to grow and manipulate, particularly more than 40% of total gene sequences,

fundamental biochemical pathways, cellular processes, and DNA repair mechanisms are highly conserved

between yeast and humans. Furthermore, yeast cells possess mitochondria and a cell nucleus, into which the

chromosomal DNA is packaged in a highly structured form, analogous to that found in mammalian cells. Thus,

cell based-biosensors emerging as powerful analytical tools are not only able to qualify and quantify the

specific substances, but also investigate the biological effects such as cytotoxicity and genotoxicity. In

addition, biosensors are rapid, reliable, lower cost methods, and they trend toward "on-site" analysis. While

physicochemical systems such as HPLC, GC-MS lack those outstanding features. In the way of development

biosensors have been intensively improving and upgrading to nanobiosensors as a result of application of

nanotechnology, thereby the sensitivity and specificity of nanobiosensors are considerably enhanced as

compared with those of conventional biosensors. Due to advancements in biotechnology and genetic

engineering, biosensor would be developed for detection of both carcinogens and procarcinogens as well as

drug screening.

Keywords: Biosensor, carcinogen, cytotoxicity, cytochrome P450 genes, DNA-damage inducible genes,

genotoxicity

IN TRODUCTION

Now adays, the increased num ber o f analytes that

can be m onitored requires more suitable analytical

methods. For conventional “off-site“ analysis,

samples need to be sent to a laboratory for

qualification and quantification. The disadvantages

o f conventional m ethods are low detection limits,

expensive, tim e-consum ing, and require the use o f

highly trained personnel (R odriguez-M ozaz, 2005).

Therefore, the current tendency to m onitor analytes

has driven the developm ent o f biosensors as new

analytical tools able to provide fast, reliable, and

sensitive m easurem ents with lower cost. M oreover,

biosensors have been developed not only to qualify

and quantify analytes, but also investigate their

biological effects on DNA and cellular activity such

as genotoxicity and cytotoxicity, or m onitor target

responses such as DNA, protein, and oxidative

dam ages, oxygen consum ption.

M any o f biosensors trend tow ards “on-site“

analysis. O bviously, biosensors would not com pete

with official analytical m ethods, but they are able to

provide enough inform ation in regards to testing and

screening o f samples. Thus, biosensors have been

designed and established for many different purposes

and widely used in agriculture, food industry,

pharm aceutical industry, and environm ental

m onitoring. Biosensors should be distinguished from

a bioassay, which require additional processing

steps, such as reagent addition (Patel, 2006). So,

what is biosensor?

DEFINITION AND CONFIGURATION OF BIOSENSOR

A biosensor is a m easurem ent device or system

that is com posed o f a biological sensing com ponent

or bioreceptor, which recognizes a chem ical or

physical change, coupled to a transducing elem ent

that produces a m easurable signal such as optical,

fluorescence/phosphorescence, bio chemiluminescence,

electrochem ical, am pero-m etric in response to the

environm ental change. The com position o f biosensor

in general is outlined in Figure 1 .

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