Photoacoustic-Based Miniature Device with Smartphone Readout for Point-of-Care Testing of Uric Acid

Real-time and rapid detection of various biomarkers in body fluids has important significance for early disease diagnosis, efficient monitoring of treatment, and evaluation of prognosis. However, traditional detection methods not only require bulky and costly instruments but also are not suitable for the analysis of heterogeneous samples (e.g., serum and urine), limiting their applications in point-of-care testing (POCT). Herein, an integrated photoacoustic (PA) device with a smartphone as the acoustic signal readout has been constructed, greatly reducing the volume and cost of the instrument, and providing a potential miniature platform for POCT of clinical samples. By exploiting the electron transfer product of 3,3',5,5'-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) (i.e., TMB++) as the PA probe and hemingraphene oxide (H-GO) complex as the peroxidase, quantitative analysis of uric acid was successfully performed by using only 30 mu L of a sample solution. Due to the favorable stability of artificial enzymes, reaction reagents could be effectively embedded in agar gel to make a portable test strip. Therefore, operators just need to drop clinical samples on the test strip for PA analysis, which is user friendly without requiring complex sample preparation steps. In addition, since the acoustic change mainly comes from the PA effect, it has a lower background signal than UV-vis and fluorescence analysis, greatly improving the analytical performance. The simplicity, low cost, and broad adaptability make this miniature PA device attractive for on-site detection, particularly in resource-limited settings.