“Four-in-One” multifunctional nanohybrids integrated magnetic colorimetric catalytic SERS-driven lateral flow immunoassay for ultrasensitive detection of MPXV

Abstract

The global outbreak of monkeypox in 2022 challenged the means of early, rapid, and accurate screening of the disease to avoid widespread outbreaks. However, as the most easy and convenient point-of-care testing (POCT) method, lateral flow immunoassay (LFA) is limited by the insufficient sensitivity and low reliability of visualizing single-signal patterns. Here, a triple-signal mode LFA (TLFA) using “four-in-one” multifunctional Au/Pt co-decorated Fe3O4 (MS@Pt) nanotags is reported. The MS@Pt-DTNB tags with excellent magnetic, optical, peroxidase-like, and SERS properties outputs a triple-signal readout of colorimetric, catalytically enhanced colorimetric, and SERS signals for Monkeypox virus (MPXV) detection after magnetic separation. The qualitative and quantitative limits of detection (LODs) of MS@Pt-TLFA strips were 0.005 and 0.0016 ng mL−1 for MPXV A29L protein, respectively, and 73.78 and 17.724 pfu mL−1 for inactivated virus, respectively, which is 2–3 orders of magnitude more sensitive compared with the AuNP-based LFA. The diversity, complementarity, and mutual corroboration of integrated output signals in this MS@Pt-TLFA improve the flexibility, accuracy, and practicability of MPXV detection, providing a potential avenue for immunodiagnostic in a variety of application scenarios.