Biosensors for Alzheimer's disease biomarker detection: A review

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a chronic disease amongst people aged 65 and older. Increasing evidence has illustrated that early diagnosis holds the key to effective treatment of AD. A variety of detection techniques have been developed. Biosensors are excellent analytical tools which have applications in detecting the biomarkers of AD. This review includes appropriate bioreceptors to achieve highly sensitive and selective quantification of AD biomarkers by using transducers. AD biomarkers such as tau protein, amyloid β peptides and apolipoprotein E4, are firstly summarized. The most commonly used bioreceptors, including aptamers and antibodies, are also reviewed. We introduce aptamers specific to AD biomarkers, list the sequences of aptamers designed to capture AD biomarkers and compare the properties of aptamers with those of antibodies with regard to their efficiency as bio-recognition elements. We discuss the recent progress of aptamer systems' applications in AD biomarkers in biosensing. The review also discusses novel strategies used for signal amplification in sensing AD biomarkers.