An aptasensor for the detection of Pb2+ based on photoinduced electron transfer between a G-quadruplex-hemin complex and a fluorophore

Due to the threat to health of heavy metal contamination, simple and rapid detection methods for heavy metals are an urgent needed in environment protection and food safety. In this work, we have developed a fluorescent aptasensor for the 'turn-off' model detection of Pb2+. The key feature of the aptasensor is that the dye-labelled nucleic acid strand can be folded into a G-quadruplex structure in the presence of Pb2+. This conformational change induces photoinduced electron transfer (PET) between a G-quadruplex-hemin complex and 6-carboxyrhodamine X (ROX), which results in fluorescence quenching of ROX. We systematically investigated the interaction mechanism between Pb2+ and the aptasensor and the effects of several environmental parameters were also studied. Under the optimum conditions, the proposed method exhibited a good liner relationship between the concentration of Pb2+ and fluorescence quenching efficiency in the range 25-500 nM and the limit of detection was 1.02 nM. In addition, this method also manifested good performance in spiked lettuce samples with satisfactory recoveries of 87.10-109.6%. This target-induced PET platform can be further expanded to other heavy metal analysis.

Automated summary

A fluorescent aptasensor was developed for the rapid detection of Pb2+ using a G-quadruplex structure and fluorescence quenching technology. The method showed a good linear relationship and low detection limit under optimal conditions, and demonstrated satisfactory recovery rates in spiked lettuce samples. This target-induced PET platform has potential for further expansion to analyze other heavy metals.