Acetylcholinesterase biosensor based on functionalized surface of carbon nanotubes for monocrotophos detection

Monocrotophos (Ops) has been widely used as pesticide in crop production but simultaneously could accumulate in the nature and seriously impact food safety and human health. It is necessary to develop a high sensitivity biosensor for accurate and fast detection of OPs. In this study, multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) were selected as acetylcholinesterase (AChE) carrier and their surface was modified by introducing different functional groups (-SH, -NH2, -Cl, -OH), hydrophobic alkyl groups (-CH3, -(CH2)2CH3, -(CH2)7CH3, -(CH2)15CH3) and ionic liquids (-IL1, -IL2). The interaction mechanism of MWCNTs functionalized surface and AChE has been revealed by studying characteristics of AChE immobilized on different carrier surface. Finally, compared with reported references and above other modifiers, we found that MWCNTs surface modified by -IL1 was the best carrier for AChE and the detection limit of IL1-MWCNTs/AChE/GCE was 3.3 × 10−11 M. At optimum reaction condition (pH 7.0, AChE loading 0.25 U, Inhibition time 14 min), storability test indicated reactivity of IL1-MWCNTs/AChE/GCE remained above 98.5% within two weeks. For real vegetable sample detection, the recoveries of IL1-MWCNTs/AChE/GCE were found to be between 90.0% and 104%. These results demonstrated novel biosensors could act as device of high sensitivity for accurate and fast detection of OPs.