Monitoring 2,3',5,5'-tetrachlorobiphenyl with rapid and sensitive environmental aptamer sensor

Polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) detection in the environment is significant for both environmental protection and human health. Herein, a highly sensitive aptamer sensor has been established by employing a 2,3′,5,5′-tetrachlorobiphenyl (PCB72) targeting aptamer as a highly specific recognition element and a gold/silver (Au@Ag) nanocomposite as the surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) substrate for detecting environmental PCB72. The Au@Ag nanoparticles (NPs) exhibit a strong SERS enhancement and provide an efficient substrate for immobilizing the PCB72 aptamer and Raman signal labelled molecule, 4-mercaptobenzoic acid (4-MBA). The targeted PCB72 could competitively bind with the PCB72 aptamer, resulting in a few aptamers sticking to the Au@Ag NPs and the “hot spot” strengthening effect of the substrate. Under optimal conditions, this aptamer sensor exhibits great performance with high sensitivity, excellent selectivity and stability for the monitoring of PCB72, which shows an excellent linear correlation ranging from 1 to 1000 pg mL−1 with a limit of detection of 0.3 pg mL−1. Furthermore, this aptamer assay exhibits high specificity and selectivity for PCB72 with the detection error of less than 0.27 for other PCBs and 0.21 for other interfering species, even if the coexisting interferents are 100-fold concentration in the system. Additionally, the recognition mechanism of the binding of aptamers to PCB72 is analyzed via UV-vis spectroscopy and molecular docking simulations, which suggest that PCB72 could insert into the aptamers. Furthermore, this method is successfully utilized for PCB72 detection in real water samples with a simple pre-treatment. In general, this work provides a new and effective method using an environmental aptamer sensor for rapid and sensitive PCB72 detection.