Fast and Reliable Electronic Assay of a Xylella fastidiosa Single Bacterium in Infected Plants Sap

Lucia Sarcina, Eleonora Macchia*, Giuliana Loconsole, Giusy D'Attoma, Paolo Bollella, Michele Catacchio, Francesco Leonetti, Cinzia Di Franco, Vito Elicio, Gaetano Scamarcio, Gerardo Palazzo, Donato Boscia, Pasquale Saldarelli, Luisa Torsi*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

15 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Pathogens ultra-sensitive detection is vital for early diagnosis and provision of restraining actions and/or treatments. Among plant pathogens, Xylella fastidiosa is among the most threatening as it can infect hundreds of plant species worldwide with consequences on agriculture and the environment. An electrolyte-gated transistor is here demonstrated to detect X. fastidiosa at a limit-of-quantification (LOQ) of 2 ± 1 bacteria in 0.1 mL (20 colony-forming-unit per mL). The assay is carried out with a millimeter-wide gate functionalized with Xylella-capturing antibodies directly in saps recovered from naturally infected plants. The proposed platform is benchmarked against the quantitave polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) gold standard, whose LOQ turns out to be at least one order of magnitude higher. Furthermore, the assay selectivity is proven against the Paraburkholderia phytofirmans bacterium (negative-control experiment). The proposed label-free, fast (30 min), and precise (false-negatives, false-positives below 1%) electronic assay, lays the ground for an ultra-high performing immunometric point-of-care platform potentially enabling large-scale screening of asymptomatic plants.

Original languageEnglish
Article number2203900
Number of pages8
JournalAdvanced Science
Volume9
Issue number30
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 25 Oct 2022
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Keywords

  • Electrolyte gate organic field-effect transistor
  • Single bacterium sensing
  • Single-molecule assay with a large transistor

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