Different bacterial host-based lux reporter array for fast identification and toxicity indication of multiple metal ions

• Published in: Analytical and bioanalytical chemistry Vol. 412; no. 29; pp. 8127 - 8134
• Main Authors: Su, Yuchen, Liu, Chunlan, Jiang, Xuemei, Wei, Weili
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01-11-2020; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adaptability; Analysis; Analytical Chemistry; Bacteria; Bacteria - drug effects; Bacteria - genetics; Biochemistry; Biocompatibility; Biological activity; Bioluminescence; Characterization and Evaluation of Materials; Chemistry; Chemistry and Materials Science; Environmental assessment; Food Science; Genes; Genes, Bacterial; Genes, Reporter; Journalists; Laboratory Medicine; Limit of Detection; Metal ions; Metals - analysis; Metals - toxicity; Monitoring/Environmental Analysis; Plasmids; Pollutants; Promoter Regions, Genetic; Promoters; Research Paper; Selectivity; Sensor arrays; Spectrometry, Fluorescence - methods; Toxicity; China; Pattern recognition; Sensor array; Toxicity; Luminescent bacteria; Metal ions
• ISSN: 1618-2642; 1618-2650
• DOI: 10.1007/s00216-020-02943-8

Although luminescent bacteria-based bioluminescence inhibition assay has been widely used in the toxicity assessment of environmental pollutants, the response of a luminescent bacterium usually lacks specificity to a target analyte. Recently, some specific analyte inductive promoters were fused to the
lux
genes for the purpose of selective bioluminescent sensing, and suits of specific promoters were fused to
lux
genes to compose a bioluminescent array sensor for simultaneous identification of multiple analytes. However, specific promoter-based methods still suffer from drawbacks including limited selectivity, slow responding time, expensive to construct different promoters involved plasmids, and laborious to find new promoters. Herein, we proposed a novel strategy to construct a
lux
reporter array sensor by directly transforming the natural
lux
genes in different bacterial hosts without the involvement of any specific promoters. Due to the distinct pathways of signal production, the responding time of the current different bacterial host (DBH)-based
lux
reporter array has nearly an order of magnitude faster than with specific promoter-based methods. The DBH-based
lux
reporter array was successfully used for simultaneous identification, quantification, and toxicity/bioactivity assessment of multiple metal ions. Obviously, all the chemical synthetic material-based metal ion sensing methods cannot simultaneously achieve analysis and toxicity evaluation. This approach possessed additional advantages of facile construction, easy operation, high selectivity, fast response, and strong adaptability to other analytes.
Graphical abstract
A different bacterial host-based
lux
reporter array was established for simultaneous analysis and toxicity assessment of multiple metal ions.