Cell-based immobilization strategy for sensitive piezoelectric immunoassay of total prostate specific antigen

A novel yeast cell-based strategy for the immobilization of antibodies using an amine-terminated self-assembly film has been proposed. A quartz crystal microbalance sensor was according fabricated by coupling with anti-prostate specific antigen (anti-PSA) for PSA immunoassay. The crystal was modified with cysteamine to deposit yeast cells, on which anti-PSA antibodies were immobilized. The surface topologies of the as-prepared crystals were characterized by use of scanning electron microscopy. In contrast to the traditional glutaraldehyde (GLU) approach, the yeast cells could allow antibody molecules bound with higher bioactivity and achieve better immunoreaction capability. Results indicate that immunoassay prepared using the developed yeast cell-binding procedure exhibits increased analytical performance compared with that produced using the GLU cross-linking procedure. A PSA serum concentration in the range of 5.0–604.0 ng ml−1 can be determined by this new system.