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Updated: May 23, 2026
Real-time Monitoring of Ligand-receptor Interactions with Fluorescence Resonance Energy Transfer
Published on: August 20, 2012
Copolythiophene-derived colorimetric and fluorometric sensor for visually supersensitive determination of
Minhuan Lan1, Jiasheng Wu, Weimin Liu
1Key Laboratory of Photochemical Conversion and Optoelectronic Materials, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100190, People's Republic of China.
Abstract:
3-Phenylthiophene-based water-soluble copolythiophenes (CPT1) were designed for colorimetric and fluorometric detection of lipopolysaccharide (LPS). The sensor (CPT1-C) shows a high selectivity to LPS in the presence of other negatively charged bioanalytes as well an extreme sensitivity with the detection limit at picomolar level, which is the lowest ever achieved among all synthetic LPS sensors available thus far. Significantly, the sensing interaction can be apparently observed by the naked eyes, which presents a great advantage for its practical applications. The appealing performance of sensor was demonstrated to originate from the multiple electrostatic and hydrophobic cooperative interactions, synergetic with signal amplification via the conformational change of the 3-phenylthiophene-based copolymer main chain. As a straightforward application, CPT1-C is capable of rapidly discriminating the Gram-negative bacteria (with LPS in the membrane) from Gram-positive bacteria (without LPS).
