Fingerprinting antibiotics with PAE-based fluorescent sensor arrays.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Analytical Chemistry
• Chemical Engineering

Background:

• Chemical tongues are sensor arrays designed for detecting specific analytes.
• Poly(p-aryleneethynylene)s (PAE) and poly(p-phenyleneethynylene)s (PPE) are conjugated polymers with potential in sensor applications.
• Discrimination of structurally similar compounds like antibiotics remains a challenge for sensor arrays.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop an evolution process for creating a chemical tongue capable of discerning antibiotics.
• To enhance the sensor array by cross-breeding different tongue elements.
• To optimize the sensor array for superior antibiotic discrimination through pruning.

Main Methods:

• An initial 24-element tongue was created using PAE and detergents.
• This tongue was cross-bred with PPE-based elements at various pH levels to form a 30-element array.
• Principal component analysis was employed to prune the array, resulting in a six-element filial tongue.

Main Results:

• The 24-element tongue successfully discerned antibiotics.
• The enlarged 30-element array showed improved capabilities.
• The optimized six-element filial tongue demonstrated superior performance in discriminating structurally different antibiotics compared to the original and composite tongues.

Conclusions:

• An effective evolution and pruning process for generating discriminative chemical tongues was established.
• The developed method provides a strategy for creating powerful, low-selectivity sensor elements.
• This approach can be generalized for configuring sensor arrays for complex analytical tasks.