Rolling-Circle-Amplification-Assisted DNA Biosensors for Sensitive and Specific Detection of Hypochlorous Acid and Myeloperoxidase

Hypochlorous acid (HClO) is a common reactive oxygen species (ROS), with a high chemical reactivity. Myeloperoxidase (MPO) is an enzyme that catalyzes in vivo redox reactions between H2O2 and Cl- to produce HClO. Abnormal levels of HClO and MPO may lead to oxidative stress, irreversible tissue damage and, thus, serious diseases; they are thus becoming important biomarkers and therapeutic targets. In this work, using HClO-induced site-specific cleavage of phosphorothioate-modified DNA to trigger rolling circle amplification (RCA), RCA-assisted biosensors have been developed for the highly sensitive and specific detection of HClO and MPO. Only two DNA oligonucleotides are used in the sensing systems. The powerful signal-amplification capability of RCA endows the sensing systems with a high sensitivity, and the specific fluorescent response of thioflavin T (ThT) to G-quadruplexes in RCA products makes a label-free signal output possible. The proposed biosensors were demonstrated to work well not only for the sensitive and specific quantitation of HClO and MPO with detection limits of 1.67 nM and 0.33 ng/mL, respectively, but also for the screening and inhibitory capacity evaluation of MPO inhibitors, thus holding great promise in disease diagnosis and drug analysis.