Chitosan-modified graphene electrodes for DNA mutation analysis

Graphene has remarkable electrochemical properties that make it an ideal material for constructing bio-sensors. Herein, we report on a chitosan-modified graphene platform for the electrochemical detection of changes in DNA sequences. For this purpose, graphene synthesized chemically and characterized by Raman spectroscopy and Transmission electron microscopy, was covalently modified with positively charged chitosan to facilitate the immobilization of a single-stranded DNA 'capture' oligonucleotide. The covalent attachment of chitosan to graphene was confirmed by FT-IR spectroscopy and then the capture DNA was immobilized on to the chitosan modified graphene electrode. Then, the target DNA (complementary or mismatched 'mutant' DNA) was applied to the electrode and cyclic voltammetry was performed. The results of the voltammetric experiments indicate that the chitosan modified graphene electrodes immobilized with ssDNA+complementary DNA exhibit a significantly higher magnitude of redox peak current than the chitosan modified graphene electrodes immobilized with the non-complementary mutant DNAs. Together, these results demonstrate that the chitosan-graphene platform provides a rapid, stable and sensitive detection of mismatched DNA and has the potential to be used for point-of-care diagnostic tests for specific DNA mutations associated with disease conditions. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.