A novel label-free universal biosensing platform based on CRISPR/Cas12a for biomarker detection

The development of a biosensing platform with high sensitivity, high specificity, and low cost for the detection of biomarkers, especially one that is programmable and universal, is critical for disease surveillance and diagnosis, yet it remains a difficulty. Herein, we combined the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/Cas system with a fluorescent label-free biosensor platform for sensitive and specific detection of disease-related protein, small molecule and nucleic acid. In this strategy, we designed an exonuclease III -mediated target cycle and released a universal trigger chain to stimulate the enzyme activity of CRISPR/ Cas12a for additional signal amplification. The hydrolysis of ssDNA-templated silver nanoclusters (ssDNA-Ag NCs) as the reporter probe resulted in a significant decrease of fluorescence intensity. This biosensing platform can be flexibly used to the sensitive and specific determination of protein, small molecule, or microRNA in biological samples by simply transforming the target recognized sequences in the DNA hairpin. In this work, a new label-free sensing system used the fluorescent ssDNA-Ag NCs as the signal output does not need to be marked in advance and has no background signal. In addition, the method has the advantages of low cost, simple operation and high speed, and provides an innovative idea for the development of a powerful clinical diagnosis tool.

Automated summary

We developed a biosensing platform using CRISPR/Cas system and a fluorescent label-free biosensor for sensitive and specific detection of disease-related biomarkers. The system utilizes an exonuclease III-mediated target cycle and a universal trigger chain to amplify the signal. The platform can be easily transformed to detect proteins, small molecules, or microRNA in biological samples.