Project: Disposable biosensor for organophosphate detection in drinking water

The presence of pesticide residues and metabolites in water and soil currently represents one of the major issues for environmental chemistry. Organophosphate pesticides are in fact among the most important environmental pollutants because of their increasing use in agriculture. Their toxicity is mainly due to their inhibitory effect on acetylcholinesterase, a key enzyme for nerve transmission, being related to carcinogenic processes, fertility disorders, neurological diseases and respiratory dysfunction. It is therefore essential to develop quick and reliable methods for organophosphates detection in water used for human consumption, to substitute the time consuming and complicate chromatographic techniques used till date (high performance liquid chromatograpy (HPLC) and gas chromatography (GC)). Biosensors are thus a great alternative for this purpose, because they exploit high specificity of the enzymes for the given substrate. Moreover, since they do not require separation process they can be faster, simpler and they allow in situ measurements. However the coupling of a biological sensing element with an appropriate transducer to build successful biosensors presents difficulties and challenges for the good construction of these devices.This project is aimed to the construction of low-cost disposable biosensors for the monitoring of organophosphate pesticides in water, to substitute the time consuming chromatographic techniques used till date. The main objectives of BIOPHOSENS are: - To build suitable matrices to immobilise cholinesterase enzymes into screen printed electrodes- To prepare low-cost polymeric electrodic supports for this bio-composite matrices - To obtain long- life sensors where the enzyme is immobilised in the working electrode in optimum conditions, without leakage, and permitting a reproducible response to organophosphate pesticide detection.With this project a large-scale production technology for organophosphate pesticide detection is expected to be produced, with fast low cost devices that can substitute the traditional analytical techniques currently used for pesticide monitoring in drinking water.

Acronym	BIOPHOSENS (Reference Number: BBM-1926)
Project Topic	Bio-based and bio-inspired materials
Network	MATERA+
Call	Matera+ Call

Project partner

Number	Name	Role	Country
1	Inkoa Sistemas, S.L.	Coordinator	Spain
2	Institute of Physical Chemistry, Polish Academy of Sciences	Partner	Poland
3	Fundación CIDETEC (as Inkoa Sistemas S.L. subcontractor)	Partner	Spain