Nanoelectronic ELISA: A Nanoelectronic Enzyme‐Linked Immunosorbent Assay for Detection of Proteins in Physiological Solutions Small 2/2010

The cover picture illustrates a new approach to biomolecular sensing, a nanoelectronic-enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ne-ELISA). The approach combines the power of a sandwich ELISA – antibody/antigen selective binding and enzymatic conversion – with electronic detection. The illustration depicts a captured antibody (red), a captured protein (white), and a reporter antibody complex (blue) on a semiconductor nanowire (turquoise). When activated, the reporter complex releases ions, causing a pH change (yellow) in the local aqueous environment, which is detected by the nanowire. Nanowire-detection approaches have an inherent limitation for detection in physiologic fluids due to ionic screening. The ne-ELISA approach circumvents this, enabling wide applicability for biomolecule detection in physiologic fluids, as well as decreasing the detection limits by many orders of magnitude. For more information, please read the Full Paper “A Nanoelectronic Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ne-ELISA) for Detection of Proteins in Physiological Solutions” by M. Reed, T. M. Fahmy, et al., beginning on page 232.