Description
Long known for their ubiquity in displays, liquid crystals, phases of ordered fluids, have become increasingly attractive for use in chemical and biological sensing applications, owing to their unique sensitivity of their alignment to their environment coupled with clear optical feedback. Liquid crystals can quite readily sense amphiphilic molecules such as lipids, but using them as sensors in water-based solutions can be challenging owing to their high interfacial tensions. A common solution is to use a polymer, such as poly(vinyl alcohol), to stabilize the interface, but this comes at a significant cost to the sensitivity of the system.In this work, we investigate the use of purified oleosins to stabilize liquid crystal droplets and their subsequent use for biological sensing. By testing a variety of concentrations of oleosin and a range of liquid crystal materials, we find that the oleosins are capable of stabilizing the interface. When we use non-chiral liquid crystals, the stabilized interface remains responsive to the further introduction of amphiphiles at a higher sensitivity compared to PVA. In contrast, with chiral liquid crystals, the liquid crystals themselves responded to the presence of oleosins at extremely low concentrations, serving as a basis for oleosin sensing. These findings can be further used in the development of sensing platforms, giving us clues as to how we can improve sensitivity and specificity of our sensors for later use.
| Period | 23 May 2023 |
|---|---|
| Event title | 3rd International Conference on Lipid Droplets and Oleosomes |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Wageningen, NetherlandsShow on map |