To control and optimize the speed of a molecular biosensor, it is crucial to quantify and understand the mechanisms that underlie the time-dependent response of the sensor. Here, we study how the kinetic properties of a particle-based sandwich immunosensor depend on underlying parameters, such as reactant concentrations and the size of the reaction chamber. The data of the measured sensor responses could be fitted with single-exponential curves, with characteristic response times that depend on the analyte concentration and the binder concentrations on the particle and substrate. By comparing characteristic response times at different incubation configurations, the data clarifies how two distinct reaction pathways play a role in the sandwich immunosensor, namely, analyte binding first to particles and thereafter to the substrate, and analyte binding first to the substrate and thereafter to a particle. For a concrete biosensor design, we found that the biosensor is dominated by the reaction pathway where analyte molecules bind first to the substrate and thereafter to a particle. Within this pathway, the binding of a particle to the substrate-bound analyte dominates the sensor response time. Thus, the probability of a particle interacting with the substrate was identified as the main direction to improve the speed of the biosensor while maintaining good sensitivity. We expect that the developed immunosensor and research methodology can be generally applied to understand the reaction mechanisms and optimize the kinetic properties of sandwich immunosensors with particle labels.
Keywords: binder densities; biosensor kinetics; particle-based biosensing; reaction pathways; response time; sandwich immunosensor.