Biotech Updates

Purdue Scientists to Improve Biosensors Using Carbon Nanotubes

November 18, 2011

Scientists at Purdue University have developed a new technique for stacking synthetic DNA and carbon nanotubes onto a biosensor electrode. This breakthrough may lead to more accurate measurements for research on diabetes and other diseases.

Carbon nanotubes could potentially improve sensor performance. However, it is not compatible with water. Professors Marshal Porterfield and Jong Hyun Choi have found a solution to this limitation. They developed a synthetic DNA that will attach to the surface of the carbon nanotubes to make them soluble in water.

"In the future, we will be able to create a DNA sequence that is complementary to the carbon nanotubes and is compatible with specific biosensor enzymes for the many different compounds we want to measure," Porterfield said. "It will be a self-assembling platform for biosensors at the biomolecular level."

Read more information at http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/research/2011/111114PorterfieldDNA.html.