Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters

Uziel, Yonatan; Kabessa, Yossef; Shemer, Benjamin; Shpigel, Etai; Belkin, Shimshon; Agranat, Aharon J.

doi:10.3390/chemosensors12100207

Open AccessArticle

Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters

by

Yonatan Uziel

^1,*,

Yossef Kabessa

¹

,

Benjamin Shemer

²

,

Etai Shpigel

²,

Shimshon Belkin

²

and

Aharon J. Agranat

¹

Department of Applied Physics and the Brojde Center for Innovative Engineering and Computer Science, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 9190401, Israel

²

Department of Plant & Environmental Sciences, Institute of Life Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 9190401, Israel

^*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Chemosensors 2024, 12(10), 207; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors12100207

Submission received: 26 August 2024 / Revised: 26 September 2024 / Accepted: 2 October 2024 / Published: 11 October 2024

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Low-Cost Chemosensors for Applications in Environment, Health, Food, and Industry Process Control)

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Abstract

We present a generic quantitative chemical sensing methodology for assessing the concentration of a target material (TM) in an aqueous solution by using bioluminescent microbial bioreporters as the core sensing elements. Such bioreporters, genetically engineered to respond to the presence of a TM in their microenvironment by emitting bioluminescence, have previously been mostly designed to report the presence or absence of the TM in the sample. We extend this methodology to also assess the TM concentration, by exploiting the dose-dependency of the TM-induced luminescence. To overcome luminescence intensity variations due to bacterial batch differences and the ambient temperature, simultaneous measurements were carried out on sample solutions containing known concentrations of the TM. A “standard ratio” parameter, defined as the ratio between the two measurements, is shown to be independent of the bacterial batch and the temperature, and hence provides the conceptual basis for a generic quantitative chemical sensing methodology. Assessment of 2,4-dinitrotoluene (DNT) concentration in solutions is demonstrated with an accuracy of 2.5% over a wide dynamic range.

Keywords: bacterial whole-cell biosensors; bioreporters; bioluminescence; quantitative chemical sensing; optoelectronic biosensor module; explosives

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MDPI and ACS Style

Uziel, Y.; Kabessa, Y.; Shemer, B.; Shpigel, E.; Belkin, S.; Agranat, A.J. Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters. Chemosensors 2024, 12, 207. https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors12100207

AMA Style

Uziel Y, Kabessa Y, Shemer B, Shpigel E, Belkin S, Agranat AJ. Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters. Chemosensors. 2024; 12(10):207. https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors12100207

Chicago/Turabian Style

Uziel, Yonatan, Yossef Kabessa, Benjamin Shemer, Etai Shpigel, Shimshon Belkin, and Aharon J. Agranat. 2024. "Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters" Chemosensors 12, no. 10: 207. https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors12100207

APA Style

Uziel, Y., Kabessa, Y., Shemer, B., Shpigel, E., Belkin, S., & Agranat, A. J. (2024). Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters. Chemosensors, 12(10), 207. https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors12100207

Note that from the first issue of 2016, this journal uses article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.

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Quantitative Chemical Sensing Using Genetically Engineered Bacterial Bioreporters

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