Ultrasensitive detection of microcystin-LR with gold immunochromatographic assay assisted by a molecular imprinting technique.

A simple and highly sensitive lateral flow immunochromatographic assay (LFICA) towards microcystin-LR (MC-LR) was proposed in this study. Molecular imprinting technique was combined with enzyme assisted colorimetric method to substantially enhance the sensitivity of traditional LFICA. The target, i.e., MC-LR molecular, was first separated from the complex matrix by molecularly-imprinted polymers (MIPs). Then, the obtained MC-LR was detected by LFICA based on the blue color generated by an enzyme-substrate reaction. Using the proposed assay, under optimal conditions, the determination of MC-LR was doable in a wide linear range from 0.1 ng/mL to 100 ng/mL with a detection limit of 0.04 ng/mL. In addition, the reliability of the developed method was validated by determining MC-LR contents in real samples. The overall results suggested that the neoteric LFICA method possess great potential in sensitive detection of MC-LR.