Surface plasmon resonance immunosensor for ErbB2 breast cancer biomarker determination in human serum and raw cancer cell lysates

•A SPR biosensor for ErbB2 breast cancer biomarker has been developed.•Amplification with gold nanoparticles enhanced the sensitivity.•A detection limit of 180 pg mL−1 has been achieved in human serum.•Raw lysates from model breast cancer cell lines have been successfully assayed.

A highly sensitive surface plasmon resonance (SPR) immunosensor for the important ErbB2 breast cancer biomarker has been developed. Optimization of the assay has been carried out, including signal enhancement employing gold nanoparticles (GNPs). The effect of the signal amplification of the GNPs has been also studied. The assay has been tested with clinically relevant matrices. Results in 50% human serum yielded a LOD of 180 pg mL−1 which is a concentration 83 times lower than the clinical cut-off. Raw lysates from model breast cancer cell lines (SK-BR-3, MCF-7 and MDA-MB-436) have been also assayed and higher quantities of the ErbB2 protein were clearly observed in the ErbB2 over-expressing case (SK-BR-3). The results confirmed that the simple and highly sensitive SPR immunosensor represents a feasible tool for ErbB2 detection.

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