Disposable lateral flow-through strip for smartphone-camera to quantitatively detect alkaline phosphatase activity in milk

A disposable lateral flow-through strip was developed for smartphone to fast one-step quantitatively detect alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity in raw milk. The strip comprises two functional components, a conjugation pad loaded with phosphotyrosine-coated gold nanoparticles (AuNPs@Cys-Try-p) and a testing line coated with anti-phosphotryosine antibody (anti-Tyr-p mAb). The dephosphorylation activity of ALP at the testing zone can be quantitatively assayed by monitoring the accumulated AuNPs-induced color changes by smartphone camera, thus providing a highly convenient portable detection method. A trace amount of ALP as low as 0.1 U L−1 with a linear dynamic range of 0.1-150 U L−1 (R2=0.999) in pasteurized milk and raw milk can be one-step detected by the developed flow-through strip within 10 min, demonstrating the potential of smartphone-based portable sensing device for pathogen detection. This bio-hazards free lateral flow-through testing strip can be also used to fabricate rapid, sensitive and inexpensive enzyme or immunosensors for broad portable clinic diagnosis and food contamination analysis, particularly in point-of-care and daily food quality inspection.