Defining the copper binding aptamotif and aptamer integrated recovery platform (AIRP).
The potential copper binding sites in aptamers have been predicted on the basis of secondary structures and the binding affinity of aptamers with copper. Out of the 4 aptamers (Cu-A1 to Cu-A4) selected by SELEX and examined in the present study, the Cu-A2 aptamer shows the highest binding affinity to copper with the lowest KDvalue of 1.83 × 10-11M. In order to confirm the binding of copper to the proposed region, the binding affinity was experimentally validated using mutation and deletion analysis. We have confirmed that the high G-C pairing patterns and short stem-interval distance play important roles in copper binding. Aptamer specificity was also verified against diverse heavy metals. We also demonstrate an Aptamer Integrated Recovery Platform (AIRP) to recover copper from acidic mine drainage. AIRP can be easily regenerated at least 20 times without significant deterioration of the retrieval performance. To the best of our knowledge, AIRP is the first demonstration of copper specific recovery using aptamers. This can be scaled up and would have diverse applications in metal contaminated water treatment, recovery and as a potential biosensor for environmental analysis, monitoring, and risk assessment.
School of Biological Sciences, Chungbuk National University, 1 Chungdae-Ro, Seowon-Gu, Cheongju 28644, South Korea. jyahn@chungbuk.ac.kr kyh@chungbuk.ac.kr.
Simranjeet Singh
SS
Sekhon
School of Biological Sciences, Chungbuk National University, 1 Chungdae-Ro, Seowon-Gu, Cheongju 28644, South Korea. jyahn@chungbuk.ac.kr kyh@chungbuk.ac.kr.
Sang-Hee
SH
Lee
School of Biological Sciences, Chungbuk National University, 1 Chungdae-Ro, Seowon-Gu, Cheongju 28644, South Korea. jyahn@chungbuk.ac.kr kyh@chungbuk.ac.kr.
Kyeong-Ah
KA
Lee
Department of Bioprocess Engineering, Chonbuk National University, 567 Baekje-daero, Deokjin-Gu Jeonju 54896, South Korea.
Jiho
J
Min
School of Earth Sciences and Environmental Engineering, Gwangju Institute of Sciences and Technology (GIST), 123 Cheomdan-gwagiro, 500-712, South Korea.
Byung-Tae
BT
Lee
School of Earth Sciences and Environmental Engineering, Gwangju Institute of Sciences and Technology (GIST), 123 Cheomdan-gwagiro, 500-712, South Korea.
Kyoung-Woong
KW
Kim
School of Biological Sciences, Chungbuk National University, 1 Chungdae-Ro, Seowon-Gu, Cheongju 28644, South Korea. jyahn@chungbuk.ac.kr kyh@chungbuk.ac.kr.
Ji-Young
JY
Ahn
School of Biological Sciences, Chungbuk National University, 1 Chungdae-Ro, Seowon-Gu, Cheongju 28644, South Korea. jyahn@chungbuk.ac.kr kyh@chungbuk.ac.kr.
Yang-Hoon
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3406-4868
YH
Kim