Cyclodextrin-based superparamagnetic host vesicles as ultrasensitive nanobiocarriers for electrosensing.

A carbohydrate-based nanohybrid of superparamagnetic nanoparticles embedded in unilamellar bilayer vesicles of amphiphilic β-cyclodextrins (magnetic cyclodextrin vesicles, mCDVs) has been engineered as a novel magnetic biorecognition probe for electrosensing. As a proof-of-concept, the synergistic properties of these mCDVs on a magneto nanocomposite carbon-paste electrode (mNC-CPE) have been used for the picomolar determination of thyroxine (T4) as a model analyte (taking advantage of the host-guest chemistry of β-cyclodextrin and T4), resulting in the most sensitive electrochemical T4 system reported in the literature. Accordingly, a first demonstration of mCDVs as alternative water-soluble magnetic nanobiocarriers has been devised foreseeing their successful use as alternative electrochemical biosensing platforms for the supramolecular trace determination of alternative targets.