Molecular super-gluing: a straightforward tool for antibody labelling and its application to mycotoxin biosensing

Mycotoxins are low molecular weight toxic compounds, which can cause severe health problems in animals and humans. Immunoassays allow rapid, simple and cost-efective screening of mycotoxins. Sandwich assays with a direct readout provide great improvement in terms of selectivity and sensitivity, comp...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Prádanas González, Fernando, Glahn Martínez, Ana Bettina, Benito Peña, María Elena, Arola, Henri O., Nevanen, Tarja K., Moreno Bondi, María Cruz
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2022
País:España
Institución:Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM)
Repositorio:Docta Complutense
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:docta.ucm.es:20.500.14352/71300
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/71300
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:543
SpyTag/SpyCatcher
Fluorescent recombinant fusion proteins
Non-competitive immunoassay
HT-2 toxin
Food safety
Química analítica (Química)
2301 Química Analítica
Descripción
Sumario:Mycotoxins are low molecular weight toxic compounds, which can cause severe health problems in animals and humans. Immunoassays allow rapid, simple and cost-efective screening of mycotoxins. Sandwich assays with a direct readout provide great improvement in terms of selectivity and sensitivity, compared to the widely used competitive assay formats, for the analysis of low molecular weight molecules. In this work, we report a non-competitive fuorescence anti-immune complex (IC) immunoassay, based on the specifc recognition of HT-2 toxin with a pair of recombinant antibody fragments, namely antigen-binding fragment (Fab) (anti-HT-2 (10) Fab) and single-chain variable fragment (scFv) (anti-IC HT-2 (10) scFv). The SpyTag and SpyCatcher glue proteins were applied for the frst time as a bioconjugation tool for the analysis of mycotoxins. To this aim, a SpyTag-mScarlet-I (fuorescent protein) and scFv-SpyCatcher fusion proteins were constructed, produced and fused in situ during the assay by spontaneous Tag-Catcher binding. The assay showed an excellent sensitivity with an EC50 of 4.8±0.4 ng mL−1 and a dynamic range from 1.7±0.3 to 13±2 ng mL−1, an inter-day reproducibility of 8.5% and a high selectivity towards HT-2 toxin without cross-reactivity with other Fusarium toxins. The bioassay was applied to the analysis of the toxin in an oat reference material and in oat samples, with a LOD of 0.6 µg kg−1, and the results were validated by analysing a certifcate reference material and by HPLC–MS/MS.