Development of a Simple Pretreatment Immunoassay Based on an Organic Solvent-Tolerant Nanobody for the Detection of Carbofuran in Vegetable and Fruit Samples
Jin-ru Zhang,
Yu Wang,
Jie-xian Dong,
Jin-yi Yang,
Yu-qi Zhang,
Feng Wang,
Rui Si,
Zhen-lin Xu,
Hong Wang,
Zhi-li Xiao,
Yu-dong Shen
Affiliations
Jin-ru Zhang
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Yu Wang
Guangzhou Institute of Food Inspection, Guangzhou 510080, China
Jie-xian Dong
Department of Entomology and Nematology and UCD Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA
Jin-yi Yang
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Yu-qi Zhang
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Feng Wang
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Rui Si
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Zhen-lin Xu
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Hong Wang
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Zhi-li Xiao
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Yu-dong Shen
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety, National-Local Joint Engineering Research Center for Processing and Safety Control of Livestock and Poultry Products, College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Nanobodies are one-tenth the size of conventional antibodies and are naturally obtained from the atypical heavy-chain-only antibodies present in camelids. Their small size, high solubility, high stability, and strong resilience to organic solvents facilitate their use as novel analytical reagents in immunochemistry. In this study, specific nanobodies against pesticide carbofuran were isolated and characterized from an immunized library via phage display platform. We further established an indirect competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) using nanobody Nb316 to detect carbofuran in vegetable and fruit samples. The results showed a half-maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) of 7.27 ng/mL and a detection limit of 0.65 ng/mL. A simplified sample pretreatment procedure omitting the evaporation of organic solvent was used. The averaged recovery rate of spiked samples ranged between 82.3% and 103.9%, which correlated with that of standard UPLC−MS/MS method. In conclusion, a nanobody with high specificity for carbofuran was characterized, and a nanobody-based sensitive immunoassay for simple and rapid detection of carbofuran in real samples was validated.