Streptavidin-functionalized capillary immune microreactor for highly efficient chemiluminescent immunoassay

A streptavidin functionalized capillary immune microreactor was designed for highly efficient flow-through chemiluminescent (CL) immunoassay. The functionalized capillary could be used as both a support for highly efficient immobilization of antibody and a flow cell for flow-through immunoassay. The functionalized inner wall and the capture process were characterized using scanning electron microscopy. Compared to conventional packed tube or thin-layer cell immunoreactor, the proposed microreactor showed remarkable properties such as lower cost, simpler fabrication, better practicality and wider dynamic range for fast CL immunoassay with good reproducibility and stability. Using α-fetoprotein as model analyte, the highly efficient CL flow-through immunoassay system showed a linear range of 3 orders of magnitude from 0.5 to 200 ng mL−1 and a low detection limit of 0.1 ng mL−1. The capillary immune microreactor could make up the shortcoming of conventional CL immunoreactors and provided a promising alternative for highly efficient flow-injection immunoassay.

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► A novel capillary immune microreactor was proposed for highly efficient flow-through chemiluminescent immunoassay.
► The microreactor was prepared by functionalizing capillary inner wall with streptavidin for capture of biotinylated antibody.
► The proposed immunoassay method showed wide dynamic range, good reproducibility, stability and practicality.
► The microreactor was low-cost and disposable, and possessed several advantages over the conventional immunoreactors.