Attomolar DNA detection with chiral nanorod assemblies

Wei Ma, Hua Kuang, Liguang Xu, Li Ding, Chuanlai Xu (), Libing Wang and Nicholas A. Kotov ()
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Wei Ma: State Key Lab of Food Science and Technology, School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University
Hua Kuang: State Key Lab of Food Science and Technology, School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University
Liguang Xu: State Key Lab of Food Science and Technology, School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University
Li Ding: State Key Lab of Food Safety Test (Hunan)
Chuanlai Xu: State Key Lab of Food Science and Technology, School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University
Libing Wang: State Key Lab of Food Science and Technology, School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University
Nicholas A. Kotov: University of Michigan

Nature Communications, 2013, vol. 4, issue 1, 1-8

Abstract: Abstract Nanoscale plasmonic assemblies display exceptionally strong chiral optical activity. So far, their structural design was primarily driven by challenges related to metamaterials whose practical applications are remote. Here we demonstrate that gold nanorods assembled by the polymerase chain reaction into DNA-bridged chiral systems have promising analytical applications. The chiroplasmonic activity of side-by-side assembled patterns is attributed to a 7–9 degree twist between the nanorod axes. This results in a strong polarization rotation that matches theoretical expectations. The amplitude of the bisignate ‘wave’ in the circular dichroism spectra of side-by-side assemblies demonstrates excellent linearity with the amount of target DNA. The limit of detection for DNA using side-by-side assemblies is as low as 3.7 aM. This chiroplasmonic method may be particularly useful for biological analytes larger than 2–5 nm which are difficult to detect by methods based on plasmon coupling and ‘hot spots’. Circular polarization increases for inter-nanorod gaps between 2 and 20 nm when plasmonic coupling rapidly decreases. Reaching the attomolar limit of detection for simple and reliable bioanalysis of oligonucleotides may have a crucial role in DNA biomarker detection for early diagnostics of different diseases, forensics and environmental monitoring.

Date: 2013
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DOI: 10.1038/ncomms3689

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