Investigation of a phenylalanine-biosensor system for phenylketonuria detection

Detection and prevention of Phenylketonuria (PKU) is becoming more and more important. However, the current methods are either imprecise or time-consuming. We propose a biosensor system based on phenylalanine ammonia-lyase (PAL) immobilized on an ammonia electrode to measure blood phenylalanine for PKU prevention. The biosensor exhibits good linearity from 10-5000μM and the response time is only about 2 minutes. It remains stable for at least 5 days and less than 20% drop of the original activity after ten day storage at 4□, while the service life of the biosensor could be up to 30 days. We also develop an intelligent system to ensure optimal conditions for operation and preservation of the biosensor and to make detection more convenient and reliable. All of these advantages indicate that the newly developed method could be a better one for solving the problems of PKU detection.