Integrated multichannel all-fiber optofluidic biosensing platform for sensitive and simultaneous detection of trace analytes

Abstract An integrated multichannel all-fiber optofluidic biosensing platform (M-AOB) has been developed for a sensitive, rapid, and simultaneous detection of up to three trace analytes. The M-AOB platform employs a 1 × 3 fiber optical switch and three single-multimode fiber optic couplers for the transmission of excitation light and fluorescence and one photodiode detector for the simultaneous detection of fluorescence signals of multiple channels based on the time-resolve effect of the fiber optical switch. This design greatly simplified the entire system structure and improved light transmission efficiency. Through an indirect competitive immunoassay mechanism, we detected two highly regulated small molecules, namely, atrazine and 2,4-D, to demonstrate the value of M-AOB to the simultaneous measurement of trace analytes in water samples. The limits of detection of 0.03 μg/L and 0.04 μg/L were obtained for atrazine and 2,4-D, respectively, and were highly comparable with those of other analytical techniques. The high sensitivity of M-AOB benefited from the high light collective efficiency and low light loss of the excellent all-fiber optical structures and from the advantages of the evanescent wave technique. The regeneration of the biosensor surface, 200 assay cycles, were performed without any significant activity loss. Each assay cycle was less than 15 min. The immunoassay performance of the M-AOB, evaluated in several spiked water samples, showed good recovery, accuracy, and precision, indicating that the M-AOB was less susceptible to matrix effects of water samples. All these results illustrated that M-AOB can be readily extended toward the simultaneous and rapid detection of other trace small molecules using different biosensors modified by other analyte conjugates and their respective fluorescence-labeled antibodies.