Bacillus cereus is one of the most common foodborne pathogens found in various kinds of staple foods such as rice and wheat. A rapid and accurate detection method for this pathogen is highly desirable for the sustainable production of relevant food products. While several classical and molecular-based detection methods are available for the identification of B. cereus, they suffered one or more limitations such as the requirement for a tedious and time-consuming process, less than ideal specificity, and the lack of portability. Herein, we developed the first paper-based sensing device that exhibits high species specificity with sufficiently low limit of detection for the visual detection of specific DNA sequences of B. cereus. The success is attributed to the strategic planning of fabrication in various dimensions including thorough bioinformatics search for highly specific genes, the use of the pyrrolidinyl peptide nucleic acid (PNA) probe whose selectivity advantage is well documented, and an effective PNA immobilization and DNA-binding visualization method with an internal cross-checking system for validating the results. Testing in rice matrices indicates that the sensor is capable of detecting and distinguishing B. cereus from other bacterial species. Hence, this paper-based sensor has potential to be adopted as a practical means to detect B. cereus in food industries.

Graphical abstract

中文翻译：

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用于高效检测蜡样芽孢杆菌的吡咯烷基肽核酸的纸基传感器

蜡样芽孢杆菌是大米、小麦等各种主食中最常见的食源性病原体之一。这种病原体的快速准确检测方法对于相关食品的可持续生产是非常需要的。虽然有几种经典的和基于分子的检测方法可用于鉴定蜡状芽孢杆菌，但它们受到一个或多个限制，例如需要繁琐且耗时的过程、不够理想的特异性以及缺乏便携性。在此，我们开发了第一个基于纸张的传感设备，该设备具有高物种特异性和足够低的检测限，可用于视觉检测蜡状芽孢杆菌的特定 DNA 序列. 成功归因于各个维度的制造战略规划，包括对高度特异性基因的彻底生物信息学搜索、选择性优势被充分证明的吡咯烷基肽核酸 (PNA) 探针的使用，以及有效的 PNA 固定和 DNA 结合具有用于验证结果的内部交叉检查系统的可视化方法。在大米基质中的测试表明该传感器能够检测和区分蜡状芽孢杆菌与其他细菌物种。因此，这种基于纸张的传感器有可能被用作检测食品工业中蜡状芽孢杆菌的实用手段。

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