School of Medicine and Health Sciences Poster Presentations
Early Detection of Amylin Aggregation with a Miniature Optical-Fiber Based Sensor
Document Type
Poster
Keywords
diabetes; amylin; localized surface plasmon resonance; biosensor
Publication Date
Spring 2017
Abstract
Type II diabetes mellitus comprises 90-95% of all diabetes diagnoses in the United States and carries a high morbidity. One well-known finding in the pathophysiology of the disease is the loss of function of the β-cells of the pancreatic Islets of Langerhans that produce and secrete insulin and amylin, leading to impaired ability to regulate glucose metabolism. Recent research has revealed that in patients with diabetes, an excess of amylin monomers in the serum aggregates into toxic oligomers that accumulate on the exterior surface of the plasma membrane of the β-cells, and the presence of these amylin deposits is correlated with β-cell death via apoptosis. Diagnosis at an early stage in the disease process is essential for optimal management and reduction of the incidence of its serious complications which include cardiovascular and renal disease and limb loss. This project develops a method for detecting the early incidence of amylin aggregation by a surface-plasmon resonance biosensor developed here at GW. The sensor is fabricated by attaching antibodies differentially sensitive to amylin monomers and oligomers, by detecting shifts in the optical response of gold nanoparticles to which they are bound. The platform for the nanoparticles is the end of an optical fiber, so the biosensor can be made portable and capable of in-vivo detection of amylin aggregation. The critical bottlenecks in the workflow for sensor fabrication will be described, as will its successful implementation for protein sensing. Results to date demonstrate that the sensor can distinguish different types of antibodies and different morphologies of amylin by measuring the kinetics of binding between the analyte and the sensor. The ability to detect pathologic changes that occur before symptoms of diabetes are present carries great promise for improving outcomes by narrowing the window between disease onset and initiation of treatment. Further extensions of this work offer the potential to sense amyloid fibers related to degenerative neural disease in the early stages of plaque formation.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Open Access
1
Early Detection of Amylin Aggregation with a Miniature Optical-Fiber Based Sensor
Type II diabetes mellitus comprises 90-95% of all diabetes diagnoses in the United States and carries a high morbidity. One well-known finding in the pathophysiology of the disease is the loss of function of the β-cells of the pancreatic Islets of Langerhans that produce and secrete insulin and amylin, leading to impaired ability to regulate glucose metabolism. Recent research has revealed that in patients with diabetes, an excess of amylin monomers in the serum aggregates into toxic oligomers that accumulate on the exterior surface of the plasma membrane of the β-cells, and the presence of these amylin deposits is correlated with β-cell death via apoptosis. Diagnosis at an early stage in the disease process is essential for optimal management and reduction of the incidence of its serious complications which include cardiovascular and renal disease and limb loss. This project develops a method for detecting the early incidence of amylin aggregation by a surface-plasmon resonance biosensor developed here at GW. The sensor is fabricated by attaching antibodies differentially sensitive to amylin monomers and oligomers, by detecting shifts in the optical response of gold nanoparticles to which they are bound. The platform for the nanoparticles is the end of an optical fiber, so the biosensor can be made portable and capable of in-vivo detection of amylin aggregation. The critical bottlenecks in the workflow for sensor fabrication will be described, as will its successful implementation for protein sensing. Results to date demonstrate that the sensor can distinguish different types of antibodies and different morphologies of amylin by measuring the kinetics of binding between the analyte and the sensor. The ability to detect pathologic changes that occur before symptoms of diabetes are present carries great promise for improving outcomes by narrowing the window between disease onset and initiation of treatment. Further extensions of this work offer the potential to sense amyloid fibers related to degenerative neural disease in the early stages of plaque formation.
Comments
Poster to be presented at GW Annual Research Days 2017.