Aptamer-functionalized magnetic and fluorescent nanospheres for one-step sensitive detection of thrombin.

A one-step sandwich method is described for detecting proteins with magnetic nanospheres (MNs) and fluorescent nanospheres (FNs). Thrombin is selected as a model analyte to validate the method. Two DNA aptamers (Apt 29 and Apt 15 targeting two different exosites of thrombin) are chosen as recognition elements to modify MNs and FNs.