Electrophysical analysis of microbial cells and biosensor technology

Abstract

A new kind of biosensor system may be developed by using an electrophysical technique for measurement of electrophysical properties of microbial cells. The electro-optical (EO) analysis of cell suspensions was used as the basis for our work. It is based on the recording of changes in the optical characteristics of cell suspensions under the orienting effect of an electric field. Promising fields of use of microbial cell suspensions for EO analysis were developed. One of the promising fields is the development of biosensor systems for analysis of low-molecular-weight substances. Another field is the investigation of cellular metabolism. The most recent direction of our work is the application of EO analysis to cell detection. We showed that the determination of bacteria may be achieved by selection and matching of antibodies specific to individual bacterium types and by comparing spectra of bacteria in the presence and absence of specific antibodies. The same principles were used for investigations of the bacteria–phage interaction. Thus electro-optical analysis of cell suspensions opens new opportunities for creation of new biosensor methods in biotechnology, environmental control and medicine.

Keywords:

• Electro-orientation
• Toxic compounds
• Cell detection
• Antibody
• Phage

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by ISTC grant 615, a Russian Science Support Foundation grant, CRDF grant N REC-006, and grant Y1-P-06-09 the program ‘Basic Research and High Education’.