Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Cell-Based Sensing Of Endocrine Disrupting Substances Using Fluorescent Protein-Gold Nanoparticle Complexes, Xian Wang

Masters Theses

Developing a sensitive and effective in vitro bioassay to detect endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) would reduce the cost, eliminate the possibility of low dose effects, detect the non-monotonic dose responses, and identify mechanisms of actions. The “chemical nose” sensing method using supramolecular complexes composed of cationic monolayer functionalized gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) and fluorescent proteins (FPs) can successfully distinguish serum proteins, mammalian cells, tissue lysates, and chemotherapeutic drug mechanisms. EDCs regulate target cells via genomic or non-genomic pathways in terms of proliferative effect and response time. In this thesis, green fluorescent protein-gold nanoparticle (GFP-AuNP) sensors were used to detect the proliferative …