Biosensors and Chemical Sensors for Food and Healthcare Monitoring—Celebrating the 10th Anniversary

A special issue of Chemosensors (ISSN 2227-9040). This special issue belongs to the section "Applied Chemical Sensors".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2023) | Viewed by 10635

Special Issue Editor

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Low-cost chemical and biochemical sensors for food contaminant detection and point-of-care in the medical, environmental, and security sectors are extremely important for the wellbeing of our society. Therefore, this Special Issue aims at presenting, discussing, and reviewing the latest sensing technologies developed for practical applications outside the laboratory. The presentation of validation studies of biochemical sensors with real samples and in line with the corresponding regulation are strongly encouraged and will have higher consideration for being accepted.

In order to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Chemosensors journal, we are launching this Special Issue to publish high-quality papers from editorial board members and excellent researchers. This Special Issue will accept both review and original articles to publish a comprehensive account of state-of-the-art advancements in the capabilities of biochemical sensors to meet the needs of food and healthcare monitoring.

Dr. Jose V. Ros-Lis
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • chemical sensors
  • biosensors
  • food analysis
  • healthcare monitoring
  • sensor arrays
  • sensor applications

Published Papers (7 papers)

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Research

15 pages, 2441 KiB  
Article
Real-Time Monitoring of H2O2 Sterilization on Individual Bacillus atrophaeus Spores by Optical Sensing with Trapping Raman Spectroscopy
by Morten Bertz, Denise Molinnus, Michael J. Schöning and Takayuki Homma
Chemosensors 2023, 11(8), 445; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors11080445 - 10 Aug 2023
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1230
Abstract
Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), a strong oxidizer, is a commonly used sterilization agent employed during aseptic food processing and medical applications. To assess the sterilization efficiency with H2O2, bacterial spores are common microbial systems due to [...] Read more.
Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), a strong oxidizer, is a commonly used sterilization agent employed during aseptic food processing and medical applications. To assess the sterilization efficiency with H2O2, bacterial spores are common microbial systems due to their remarkable robustness against a wide variety of decontamination strategies. Despite their widespread use, there is, however, only little information about the detailed time-resolved mechanism underlying the oxidative spore death by H2O2. In this work, we investigate chemical and morphological changes of individual Bacillus atrophaeus spores undergoing oxidative damage using optical sensing with trapping Raman microscopy in real-time. The time-resolved experiments reveal that spore death involves two distinct phases: (i) an initial phase dominated by the fast release of dipicolinic acid (DPA), a major spore biomarker, which indicates the rupture of the spore’s core; and (ii) the oxidation of the remaining spore material resulting in the subsequent fragmentation of the spores’ coat. Simultaneous observation of the spore morphology by optical microscopy corroborates these mechanisms. The dependence of the onset of DPA release and the time constant of spore fragmentation on H2O2 shows that the formation of reactive oxygen species from H2O2 is the rate-limiting factor of oxidative spore death. Full article
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14 pages, 4863 KiB  
Article
Tailored Gas Sensors as Rapid Technology to Support the Jams Production
by Giuseppe Greco, Estefanía Núñez-Carmona, Dario Genzardi, Linda Bianchini, Pierpaolo Piccoli, Ivano Zottele, Armando Tamanini, Carola Motolose, Antonello Scalmato, Giorgio Sberveglieri and Veronica Sberveglieri
Chemosensors 2023, 11(7), 403; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors11070403 - 19 Jul 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1017
Abstract
Nowadays, innovation in food technologies is fundamental and consumers are increasingly aware and demanding. To create a final product that is more and more appealing, health and safety guidelines are pushing towards new challenges. It is precisely due to the high quality required [...] Read more.
Nowadays, innovation in food technologies is fundamental and consumers are increasingly aware and demanding. To create a final product that is more and more appealing, health and safety guidelines are pushing towards new challenges. It is precisely due to the high quality required by the producers that the aim discussed in this project has been conceived. Until today, the controls on the entire production line have been slowed down by the limitations of the technologies involved, including the high cost of instrumentation for microbiological analysis, the need for qualified personnel to carry them out, the long execution times and the invasiveness of the techniques themselves. This project has, therefore, proposed a user-friendly solution that is minimally invasive, fast and at a lower cost. This system makes use of classical microbiological analysis and, in parallel, use of an innovative electronic-nose small sensor system (S3+), which can be trained to recognize the volatile fingerprint of a specific product and customized for a specific use. The aim of this project was to develop a system that is able to detect the mold contamination on fruit and vegetable jams and marmalades, using a new kind of innovative metal semiconductor gas sensor (MOS) device. The application of this technology has, therefore, made it possible to classify various samples of uncontaminated and contaminated fruit and vegetable preparations. Thanks to the classification implemented by a data-driven algorithm, it has been possible to build an anomaly detector that is able to recognize the occurrence of possible contamination, thus acting as an early alert system in the food chain. All this will occur in less than 1 min once the system is trained, in contrast with classical microbiological or chemical techniques that normally require longer timeframes to obtain a result and involve the use of reagents, increasing the costs. Full article
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15 pages, 4193 KiB  
Article
Highly Selective Uricase-Based Quantification of Uric Acid Using Hydrogen Peroxide Sensitive Poly-(vinylpyrrolidone) Templated Copper Nanoclusters as a Fluorescence Probe
by Ramar Rajamanikandan, Malaichamy Ilanchelian and Heongkyu Ju
Chemosensors 2023, 11(5), 268; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors11050268 - 01 May 2023
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1714
Abstract
We reported on uric acid (UA) detection using a new fluorescence-based assay: poly-(vinylpyrrolidone) templated copper nanoclusters (PVP-CuNCs) with uricase in an aqueous medium, such as human urine with uricase. These nanoclusters were synthesized in a simple wet chemical method and their morphological and [...] Read more.
We reported on uric acid (UA) detection using a new fluorescence-based assay: poly-(vinylpyrrolidone) templated copper nanoclusters (PVP-CuNCs) with uricase in an aqueous medium, such as human urine with uricase. These nanoclusters were synthesized in a simple wet chemical method and their morphological and optical properties were examined with the aid of high-resolution transmission electron microscopy and optical absorbance/emission spectroscopy. The PVP-CuNCs acted as the fluorescence indicators that used the enzyme-catalyzed oxidation of UA with uricase. Adding UA into the hybrid PVP-CuNCs/uricase solution caused enzyme-catalyzed oxidation to occur, producing hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), allantoin, and carbon dioxide. The fluorescence intensity of PVP-CuNCs is decreased by this biocatalytically generated H2O2, and this decrease is proportional to the UA level. A calibration plot showed the linear relationship with the negative slope between fluorescence intensity and UA in the range of 5–100 × 10−7 mol/L. The limit of detection (LOD) of UA was estimated as 113 × 10−9 mol/L. This fluorescent probe turned out to be highly specific for UA over other biologically relevant molecules. The demonstrated capability of the PVP-CuNCs as the nanoprobes for quantification of the UA levels in human urine samples could potentially pave the way toward medical applications where a super-sensitive, cost-effective, and UA-specific diagnosis was required. Full article
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15 pages, 6567 KiB  
Article
Combinatorial Material Strategy: Parallel Synthesis and High-Throughput Screening of WO3 Nanoplates Decorated with Noble Metals for VOCs Sensor
by Yanjia Ma, Ming Hou, Li Yang, Jiyun Gao, Guozhu Zhang, Ronghui Guo and Shenghui Guo
Chemosensors 2023, 11(4), 239; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors11040239 - 11 Apr 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1132
Abstract
In this study, we report on the rapid preparation of WO3 nanoplates decorated with noble metals and evaluate their gas-sensing performance using a high-throughput screening technique. The incorporation of Pd significantly enhanced the gas-sensing properties, and, among all of the samples tested, [...] Read more.
In this study, we report on the rapid preparation of WO3 nanoplates decorated with noble metals and evaluate their gas-sensing performance using a high-throughput screening technique. The incorporation of Pd significantly enhanced the gas-sensing properties, and, among all of the samples tested, the WO3 nanoplate containing 0.3 mol% Pd exhibited the highest response to 100 ppm xylene at 250 °C (Ra/Rg = 131.2), which was almost 56 times greater than that of the pure WO3 sample. Additionally, this sample demonstrated rapid response and recovery times (τresponse = 3.9 s and τrecovery = 189.2 s, respectively). The nanoplate samples were also classified and screened using cluster analysis, and the selected samples were optimized for use in a sensor array. By applying principal component analysis and Fisher discriminant analysis, four typical gases were identified and a potential sensitization mechanism was elucidated. Full article
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10 pages, 2946 KiB  
Article
Automated Multistep Lateral Flow Immunoassay Using a Smartphone for the Quantification of Foodborne Bacteria from Fresh Lettuce
by Pattarapon Phangwipas, Balamurugan Thangavel and Joong Ho Shin
Chemosensors 2023, 11(1), 36; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors11010036 - 02 Jan 2023
Viewed by 1847
Abstract
Foodborne illnesses are one of the most severe and prevalent health problems in the world. Thus, achieving the rapid and accurate identification of foodborne pathogens is important. This study presents an automatic device to perform a multistep immunoassay on a lateral flow immunoassay [...] Read more.
Foodborne illnesses are one of the most severe and prevalent health problems in the world. Thus, achieving the rapid and accurate identification of foodborne pathogens is important. This study presents an automatic device to perform a multistep immunoassay on a lateral flow immunoassay strip to detect foodborne pathogens from fresh lettuce. The device is automatically operated using a smartphone application that we developed, which allows users to quantify the detection results. In this study, we characterize the device’s limit of detection and demonstrate the detection and quantification of Escherichia coli O157:H7 from contaminated lettuce. We then compare the quantified result to that calculated by counting colonies from agar plates. The device is capable of detecting contamination in lettuces that have as low as 5 × 104 Escherichia coli O157:H7 per 10 g. Full article
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15 pages, 3589 KiB  
Article
A Non–Enzymatic Electrochemical Sensor of Cu@Co–MOF Composite for Glucose Detection with High Sensitivity and Selectivity
by Zhen-Zhen Ma, Yue-Shu Wang, Bing Liu, Huan Jiao and Ling Xu
Chemosensors 2022, 10(10), 416; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors10100416 - 12 Oct 2022
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 1641
Abstract
A 3D cobalt metal–organic framework (Co–MOF), [Co3(BDC)3(DMU)2], was utilized to prepare Cu@Co–MOF composite in a deposition–reduction process. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE (GCE = glassy carbon electrode) electrode was prepared by “drop–coating” method. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE shows excellent electrocatalytic activity for Glu detection. [...] Read more.
A 3D cobalt metal–organic framework (Co–MOF), [Co3(BDC)3(DMU)2], was utilized to prepare Cu@Co–MOF composite in a deposition–reduction process. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE (GCE = glassy carbon electrode) electrode was prepared by “drop–coating” method. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE shows excellent electrocatalytic activity for Glu detection. The chronoamperometric response of Cu@Co–MOF/GCE to Glu concentration (CGlu) displays linear relationships in two CGlu sections with calculated sensitivities of 282.89 μA mM−1 cm−2 within 0.005–0.4 mM Glu and 113.15 μA mM−1 cm−2 within 0.4–1.8 mM Glu. The detection limit is calculated as 1.6 μM at S/N = 3. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE also exhibits a rapid current response, high anti–interference, stability, and repeatability to Glu detection. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE was applied to detect Glu in human serum and orange juice. All found CGlu are very close to those added CGlu with low RSDs and high recoveries. Cu@Co–MOF/GCE as a non–enzymatic electrochemical sensor of Glu has high sensitivity, selectivity, accuracy, and reliability. Full article
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14 pages, 7764 KiB  
Article
A High-Precision Three-Dimensional Probe Array Temperature Sensor
by Bian Tian, Yifan Xing, Xuefeng Zhang, Zhaojun Liu, Zhongkai Zhang, Jiangjiang Liu, Bingfei Zhang, Qijing Lin and Zhuangde Jiang
Chemosensors 2022, 10(8), 309; https://doi.org/10.3390/chemosensors10080309 - 05 Aug 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1446
Abstract
To meet the need for micro-volume devices for high-precision measurement of temperature, Cu-Constantan (CuNi45) thin films with a novel array structure of thermo-electrodes were designed and fabricated. The thermo-electrodes on the probe-type substrate were deposited by magnetron sputtering technology and the profiling mask [...] Read more.
To meet the need for micro-volume devices for high-precision measurement of temperature, Cu-Constantan (CuNi45) thin films with a novel array structure of thermo-electrodes were designed and fabricated. The thermo-electrodes on the probe-type substrate were deposited by magnetron sputtering technology and the profiling mask was prepared by 3D printing technology. The comprehensive performance of the temperature sensor was improved by systematic optimization of the heat treatment process and accuracy correction algorithm. Results showed that the sensor can measure with an accuracy of up to ±0.19%FS from −60 °C to 200 °C. The three-dimensional probe array temperature sensor shows great advantages in sensitivity, reliability resolution, stability, and measurement accuracy. Full article
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