Plenary Lecture: Miniaturisation and nanotechnology PL9

Enhanced detection of biomarkers using metal

nanoparticles
José M. Costa-Fernández, Marta García Cortés, Mario Menéndez Miranda,
Diego Bouzas Ramos, Jorge Ruiz and Alfredo Sanz-Medel
Department of Physical and Analytical Chemistry, University of Oviedo, Avda. Julian Claveria, 8,
33006 Oviedo, Spain
E-mail: jcostafe@uniovi.es

With the recent development of nanotechnology, different types of nanomaterials

have been used successfully in a wide variety of applications in analytical chemistry;
among these nanomaterials semiconducting metal nanoparticles (known as "quantum
dots", QDs) have been used with great success as labels in the development of
bioanalytical applications. In addition, in the development of bioanalytical
methodologies involving the use of QDs, elemental mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) is
especially attractive due to the extreme sensitivity shown by this technique for the
detection of metals (such as those present in the core of QDs), low effects of matrix
and the ability of simultaneous detection multielemental and isotopic (which offers a
high potential for multiplexed analysis) [1].

It should be considered that the success or failure in the use of the luminescent
nanomaterials in these applications is largely determined by the ability to
bioconjugate such nanoparticles to specific recognition elements, such as aptamers or
antibodies, a mandatory previous step for the successful development of new
bioassay and bioanalytical applications based on biolabeling and bioimaging. Despite
recent progress in the use of QDs and NCs for bioanalytical applications, there is still
an urgent need for effective procedures for the nanomaterials bioconjugates
purification and characterization, in order to further facilitate reliable quantitative
bioassays.

In this context, in this communication a diagnostic tool to control the quality of

water-solubilized metal nanoparticles based on the combination of asymmetric field
flow fractionation nanoparticles separation coupled on-line with elemental
(inductively coupled plasma-mass spectroscopy, ICP-MS) and molecular (UV-VIS
and fluorescence) detection will be also presented.

Moreover, we will also describe our latest efforts of using metal nanoparticles lo
label proteins and so to amplify enormously the corresponding ICP-MS signals of the
bioconjugates NPs-antibodies targeting the protein(s) of interest for targeted
proteomics issues. The proof of concept of such novel approaches and application to
real-life simultaneous ICP-MS determinations of a panel of known proteins, to act as
"early alarm biomarkers" of ocular diseases (e.g. glaucoma), will be discussed [2].
References
[1] Diez Fernández S, Sugishama N, Ruiz Encinar J, Sanz-Medel A Anal Chem., 2012, 84: 5851-
5857.
[2] Montoro Bustos AR, Garcia-Cortes M, González-Iglesias H, Ruiz Encinar J, Costa-Fernández J.M,
Coca-Prados M, Sanz-Medel A Anal. Chim. Acta, 2015 doi: 10.10 16/j.aca.2015.03 .015.

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