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Sensitive photoelectrochemical detection of colitoxin DNA based on NCDs@CuO/ZnO heterostructured nanocomposites with efficient separation capacity of photo-induced carriers

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Abstract

A metal–organic framework (MOF) of Cu-TPA (terephthalic acid) microsphere was prepared, followed by calcinating the MOF precursor of Cu-TPA/ZIF-8 mixture to obtain the CuO/ZnO. N-doped carbon dots (NCDs) were employed to combine the CuO/ZnO composite to form a tripartite heterostructured architecture of NCDs@CuO/ZnO, which led to a fierce enlargement of the photocurrent response. This  was ascribed to the thinner-shell structure of the CuO microsphere and the fact that hollow ZnO particles could sharply promote the incidence intensity of visible light. The more porous defectiveness exposed on CuO/ZnO surface was in favor of rapidly infiltrating electrolyte ions. The p-n type CuO/ZnO composite with more contact interface could abridge the transfer distance of photo-induced electron (e−1)/hole (h+) pairs and repress their recombination availably. NCDs not only could boost electron transfer rate on the electrode interface but also successfully sensitized the CuO/ZnO composite, which resulted in high conversion efficiency of photon-to-electron. The probe DNA (S1) was firmly assembled on the modified ITO electrode surface (S1/NCDs@CuO/ZnO) through an amidation reaction. Under optimal conditions, the prepared DNA biosensor displayed a wide linear range of 1.0 × 10−6 ~ 7.5 × 10−1 nM and a low limit of detection (LOD) of 1.81 × 10−7 nM for colitoxin DNA (S2) measure, which exhibited a better photoelectrochemistry (PEC) analysis performance than that obtained by differential pulse voltammetry techniques. The relative standard deviation (RSD) of the sensing platform for target DNA detection of 5.0 × 10−2 nM was 6.3%. This proposed DNA biosensor also showed good selectivity, stability, and reproducibility, demonstrating that the well-designed and synthesized photoactive materials of NCDs@CuO/ZnO are promising candidates for PEC analysis.

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Funding

This work was financially supported by the Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (No. 2019A1515010618), the Guangdong Special Funds for the Science & Technology Project (No. 2019ST029 & No. 2019ST089), 2020 Li Ka Shing Foundation Cross-Disciplinary Research Grant (Project Number 2020LKSFG06C), and Shantou Polytechnic Supported Project (No. 2019SZK2019Y01).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry and Laboratory for Preparation and Application of Ordered Structural Materials of Guangdong Province, Shantou University, Shantou, Guangdong, 515063, People’s Republic of China

    Delun Zheng, Mingxuan Peng, Kwan-Ming Ng, Yaowen Chen & Wenhua Gao

  2. Department of Natural Sciences, Shantou Polytechnic, Shantou, Guangdong, 515078, People’s Republic of China

    Delun Zheng

  3. Guangdong Shantou Supervision Testing Institute of Quality & Measuring, Shantou, Guangdong, 515041, People’s Republic of China

    Jianying Yang & Zengyao Zheng

  4. Institute of Chemical Engineering, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, Guangdong, 510665, People’s Republic of China

    Linjia Huang

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Zheng, D., Yang, J., Zheng, Z. et al. Sensitive photoelectrochemical detection of colitoxin DNA based on NCDs@CuO/ZnO heterostructured nanocomposites with efficient separation capacity of photo-induced carriers. Microchim Acta 189, 166 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-022-05280-y

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