Developing a high performance superoxide dismutase based electrochemical biosensor for radiation dosimetry of thallium 201

highlights•Our biosensor is able to measure produced superoxide radical during water radiolysis.•It has suitable linearity range, good detection limit and long term stability.•It also has proper sensitivity and high performance for low LET ionizing radiation.•The electrochemical method is as good as traditional methods for radiation dosimetry.

To develop a new biosensor for measurement of superoxide free radical generated in radiolysis reaction, three combinations of SOD-based biosensors including Au/Cys/SOD, Au/GNP/Cys/SOD and Au/GNP/Cys/SOD/Chit were fabricated. In these biosensors Au, GNP, Cys, SOD and Chit represent gold electrode, gold nano-particles, cysteine, superoxide dismutase and chitosan, respectively. For biosensors fabrication, SOD, GNP, Cys and Chit were immobilized at the surface of gold electrode. Cyclic voltametry and chronoamperometry were utilized for evaluation of biosensors performances. The results showed that Au/GNP/Cys/SOD/Chit has significantly better responses compared to Au/Cys/SOD and Au/GNP/Cys/SOD. As a result, this biosensor was selected for dosimetry of ionizing radiation. For this purpose, thallium 201 at different volumes was added to buffer phosphate solution in electrochemical cell. To obtain analytical parameters of Au/GNP/Cys/SOD/Chit, calibration curve was sketched. The results showed that this biosensor has a linear response in the range from 0.5 to 4 Gy, detection limit 0.03 μM. It also has a proper sensitivity (0.6038 nA/Gy), suitable long term stability and cost effective as well as high function for radiation dosimetry.