Aptasensor Construction for Detection of Biological Contaminants**

VITAL Biosciences(前身为Elucid Labs)是一家加拿大生物技术公司，位于安大略省滑铁卢，开发用于检测生物体液中生物标志物的护理点式生物传感器平台，以克服普遍使用的分析方法的限制，改善医疗数据采集、传输时间以及整体患者体验。在这项NSERC Engage应用中，VITAL将与Guelph大学(UOG)曼德维尔博士的实验室合作，通过使用固定策略和先进的纳米科学，努力将DNA适配子整合到现有的基于抗体的检测设计中，以构建一个通用的适配子传感器平台。该项目将专注于将适体固定在纳米颗粒上，以实现靶分子的原位过滤和浓缩，等离子体信号增强策略，无标记靶标的获取和检测的微型化。目标分子的结合必须伴随着台式设备上在相应浓度下可检测到的信号变化，并且必须与非常少量的(Ul)样品一起工作，以证明项目成功。该项目有两个主要的研究目标：(1)确定适体是否可以被纳入VITAL目前开发的技术中，以及(2)在适体传感器上使用分析组件和功能化技术，以将其用途扩展到复杂的基质中，并潜在地开发新的分析系统。为了实现这些目标，已经为凝血酶(模型蛋白靶标)和赭曲霉毒素A(OTA，模型小分子靶标)建立的适配子将被修饰以连接纳米材料和荧光染料作为靶标结合的光学读数。这一系统的成功开发将导致至关重要的商业投资组合的持续多样化，这反过来又将在安大略省西南部带来新的收入来源和公司增长。

Vital Biosciences (formerly Elucid Labs) is a Canadian biotechnology company located in Waterloo, Ontario, that develops point-of-care biosensor platforms for detection of biomarkers in biological fluids to overcome limitations in ubiquitously employed analytical methods and improve medical data acquisition, transmission time, as well as the overall patient experience. In this NSERC Engage application, Vital, with the cooperation of Dr. Manderville's laboratory at the University of Guelph (UOG), will endeavor to incorporate DNA aptamers into an existing antibody-based assay design by using immobilization strategies and advanced nanoscience to construct a general aptasensor platform. This project will focus on aptamer immobilization onto nanoparticles to enable in situ filtration and concentration of target molecules, plasmonic signal enhancement strategies, label free target acquisition and assay miniaturization. The binding of target molecules must be accompanied by a detectable signal change on a benchtop device at relevant concentrations, and must work with a very small (uL) amount of sample to demonstrate project success. This ENGAGE project has two major research objectives: (1) establish if aptamers can be incorporated in Vital's currently developed technology, and (2) employ assay components and functionalization techniques on aptasensors to expand their utility into complex matrices and potentially develop novel assay systems. To accomplish these goals, aptamers already established for thrombin (model protein target) and ochratoxin A (OTA, model small molecule target) will be modified with linking components for nanomaterial attachment and fluorescent dyes as the optical readout for target binding. Successful development of this system will cause continual diversification of the Vital commercial portfolio which, in turn, will lead to new revenue streams and company growth within South Western Ontario.