The Polymer Society of Korea

Abstract

Tetrodotoxin (TTX) is a potent neurotoxin and a significant concern for public health and environmental safety. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) is widely used for rapid TTX detection; however, conventional antibody-based competitive assays are limited by high cost, low stability, and assay complexity.
In this study, we present a peptide-imprinted polymer (PIP)-based indirect competitive ELISA (ic-ELISA) for TTX detection. TTX-binding peptide (TTX BP) was identified by biopanning and used as a template to fabricate a PIP on microplate wells via initiated chemical vapor deposition (iCVD) using a HEMA-co-EGDMA copolymer. Competitive binding between a biotinylated TTX-binding signal peptide (TTX SP) and TTX was quantified using streptavidin–HRP, resulting in a concentration-dependent decrease in absorbance. The developed PIP-based ic-ELISA exhibited excellent linear correlation with TTX concentration, demonstrating its potential as a cost-effective and robust alternative for TTX detection.
Acknowledgement: This research was supported by National R&D Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Science and ICT (Grant No. RS-2025-00517552), KIST research programs (2E33682, 2E33712, 2E3375H), and Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (Grant No. 20163MFDS641).