A Separation-Free Paper-based Hydrogel Device for One-Step Reactive Oxygen Species Determination by Smartphone

Abstract

Paper-based analytical devices (PADs) are very convenient for determining biomarkers in point-of-care (POC) diagnosis while requiring sample pre-treatment or impurity separation. This study reports a novel hydrogel-coupled, paper-based analytical device (PAD) for separation-free H2O2 colorimetric detection in both aqueous solution and cell lysis with sample-to-answer analysis by directly loading into the sample test zone. By encapsulating an inorganic mimic enzyme and chromogenic substrate into the sodium alginate (SA) hydrogel, amplification of the color signal after catalyzing the substrate could be achieved. Taking advantage of the nano-scale porous structure of the hydrogel and the lateral flow channel of the PAD, large interference fragments or bio-macromolecules are prevented from diffusing into the chromogenic reaction, whereas the small target molecules enter the sensing region to trigger the catalytic reaction. This method is demonstrated with rapid and accurate analysis with a limited detection as low as 0.06 mM with detection selectivity. Our proposed method requires no enzyme and is separation-free, portable, easy-fabricating, and low-cost, which may offer a platform for quantitative or qualitative analysis of other analytes in body fluids for POC applications.