title: A comparison of the performance of molecularly imprinted polymer nanoparticles for small molecule targets and antibodies in the ELISA format.
abstract: Here we show that molecularly imprinted polymer nanoparticles, prepared in aqueous media by solid phase synthesis with immobilised L-thyroxine, glucosamine, fumonisin B2 or biotin as template, can demonstrate comparable or better performance to commercially produced antibodies in enzyme-linked competitive assays. Imprinted nanoparticles-based assays showed detection limits in the pM range and polymer-coated microplates are stable to storage at room temperature for at least 1 month. No response to analyte was detected in control experiments with nanoparticles imprinted with an unrelated template (trypsin) but prepared with the same polymer composition. The ease of preparation, high affinity of solid-phase synthesised imprinted nanoparticles and the lack of requirement for cold chain logistics make them an attractive alternative to traditional antibodies for use in immunoassays.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, College of Science and Engineering, University of Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: Katarzyna
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Smolinska-Kempisty
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, College of Science and Engineering, University of Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Guerreiro
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, College of Science and Engineering, University of Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Canfarotta
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, College of Science and Engineering, University of Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: César
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Cáceres
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, College of Science and Engineering, University of Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: Michael J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Whitcombe
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, College of Science and Engineering, University of Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: Sergey
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Piletsky
mesh_terms: D000906:Antibodies / Q000378:metabolism*; D002138:Calibration; D000067493:Dynamic Light Scattering; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D057230:Limit of Detection; D054802:Molecular Imprinting / Q000379:methods*; D053758:Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D010316:Particle Size; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry*; D054852:Small Molecule Libraries / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology*
chemical_list: D000906:Antibodies; D011108:Polymers; D054852:Small Molecule Libraries