A new technique for the accurate and fast detection of amino acids has been developed by researchers in the US. The simple method, employing cucurbiturils and the lanthanide europium, could light the way to improvements in nutritional analysis and drug detection.
Amino acids are essential building blocks for all living beings. Abnormal amino acid levels can indicate underlying health problems such as malnutrition, pancreatitis and Alzheimer’s disease. Conventional amino acid sensing techniques involve chromatography or electrochemical methods, which can be costly and must be performed by skilled operators.
The method proposed by Pavel Anzenbacher Jr and coworkers at Bowling Green State University in Ohio analyses fluorescence signals when guest europium ions are displaced from an array of two cucurbituril host probes. One of the probes is cylindrical and prefers to bind smaller molecules in a host–guest fashion, whilst the other is a larger linear molecule that wraps around larger analytes.
Probe fluorescence is quenched when an Eu ion is bound. When the Eu is displaced by an analyte, the fluorescence is "turned-on"
Read the full article in Chemistry World»
Read the original journal article in ChemComm:
“Turn-on” fluorescent sensor array for basic amino acids in water
Tsuyoshi Minami, Nina A. Esipenko, Ben Zhang, Lyle Isaacs and Pavel Anzenbacher
Chem. Commun., 2014, Advance Article, DOI: 10.1039/C3CC47416J
