Scientists in the US have developed a multicomponent indicator displacement assay (MIDA) using a rhodium complex as a receptor which has advanced the process of detection and identification of biomolecules.

The technology, which has been developed at the Federal School of Lausanne (FSL), works through a similar means to an indicator displacement assay (IDA), in which an analyte molecule binds to a receptor and displaces an indicator molecule, consequently altering its appearance.

However, in MIDAs a range of receptor-indicator combinations are utilised, with the individually coloured bound and free molecules given rise to by each analyte resulting in an ultraviolet-visible spectrum.

Furthermore, the FSL team have incorporated three commercially available dyes into the process, through which the varying amount of dyes that analytes displace enable biologically interesting molecules to be identified.

Thus far the researchers have used the system to detect adenosine triphosphate, cyclic adenosine monophosphate and pyrophosphate in the same solution.

Kay Severin of the FSL told the Royal Society of Chemistry:"The assay is very easy to perform, it just requires mixing of commercially available substances and a low-tech analysis method, such as UV/Vis spectroscopy."

Source:
Simple sensor identifies complex mixtures
04/06/07
http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/ChemScience/Volume/2007/07/simple_sensor.asp

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