An aptasensing platform for simultaneous detection of multiple analytes based on the amplification of exonuclease-catalyzed target recycling and DNA concatemers

In the present study, an ultrasensitive electrochemical aptasensor for the simultaneous detection of thrombin (TB) and ochratoxin A (OTA) was fabricated by using exonuclease-catalyzed target recycling and DNA concatemers for signal amplification. The previously hybridized double-stranded DNAs (SH-cTBA/TBA and SH-cOBA/OBA) were self-assembled on a gold electrode. In the presence of targets, the formation of aptamer–target complexes would lead to not only the dissociation of aptamers (TBA and OBA) from the double-stranded DNAs but also the transformation of the complementary DNAs (SH-cTBA and SH-cOBA) into hairpin structures. Subsequently, owing to employment of RecJf exonuclease, which is a single-stranded DNA-specific exonuclease to selectively digest the appointed DNAs (TBA and OBA), the targets could be liberated from the aptamer–target complexes for recycling of the analytes. Thereafter, probe DNAs (T1 and T2) were employed to hybridize with SH-cTBA and SH-cOBA respectively to provide primers for the concatemer reaction. After that, when four auxiliary DNA strands S1, anthraquinone-2-carboxylic acid (AQ)-labeled S2, S3, S4, as well as hemin were introduced, extended dsDNA polymers with lots of AQ moieties and hemin–G-quadruplex complexes could form on the electrode surface. Then, based on the signal of the AQ and hemin–G-quadruplex complex, an electrochemical aptasensor for the simultaneous detection of TB and OTA was successfully fabricated.