Nanostructured sensors containing immobilized nuclear receptors for thyroid hormone detection.

Thyroid hormone receptors (TRs) are members of the nuclear receptors (NRs) superfamily, being encoded by two genes: TRa and TRbeta. In this paper, the ligand-binding domain (LBD) of the TRbeta1 isoform was immobilized on the surface of nanostructured electrodes for TR detection. The platforms containing TRbeta1-LBD were applied to the detection of specific ligand agonists, including the natural hormones T3 (triiodothyronine) and T4 (thyroxine), and the synthetic agonists TRIAC (3,5,3'-triiodothyroacetic acid) and GC-1 [3,5-dimethyl-4-(4'-hydroxy-3'-isopropylbenzyl phenoxy) acetic acid].