SPR-based plastic optical fibre biosensor for the detection of C-reactive protein in serum

A plastic optical fibre biosensor based on surface plasmonresonance for the detection of C-reactive protein (CRP)in serum is proposed. The biosensor was integrated into ahome-made thermo-stabilized microfluidic system that al-lows avoiding any thermal and/or mechanical fluctuationand maintaining the best stable conditions during themeasurements. A working range of 0.006-70 mg L-1and alimit of detection of 0.009 mg L-1were achieved. Theseresults are among the best compared to other SPR-basedbiosensors for CRP detection, especially considering thatthey were achieved in a real and complex medium, i.e.serum. In addition, since the sensor performances satisfythose requested in physiologically-relevant clinical appli-cations, the whole biosensing platform could well addresshigh sensitive, easy to realize, real-time, label-free, porta-ble and low cost diagnosis of CRP for future lab-on-a-chipapplications.