A fluorescent turn-on detection scheme for α-fetoprotein using quantum dots placed in a boronate-modified molecularly imprinted polymer with high affinity for glycoproteins

This article describes a fluorescent molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) capable of selective fluorescent turn-on recognition of the tumor biomarker alpha-fetoprotein. The technique is making use of amino-modified Mn-doped ZnS quantum dots (QDs) as solid supports, 4-vinylphenylboronic acid and methyl methacrylate as the functional monomers, gamma-methacryloxypropyl trimethoxysilane as the grafting agent, and alpha-fetoprotein as a template. A graft imprint is created on the surface of the QDs. The functional monomers are shown to play an important role in the formation of the binding sites and in preventing nonspecific protein binding. The resulting MIP-QDs display a good linear response to alpha-fetoprotein in the 50 ng center dot L-1 to 10 mu g center dot L-1 concentration range, and the limit of detection is 48 ng center dot L-1. In our perception, the method has a wide scope in that it may be adapted to various other glycoproteins.