Apoptosis Evaluation by Electrochemical Techniques

Abstract

Apoptosis has close relevance to pathology, pharmacology, and toxicology. Accurate and convenient detection of apoptosis would be beneficial for biological study, clinical diagnosis, and drug development. Based on distinct features of apoptotic cells, a diversity of analytical techniques have been exploited for sensitive analysis of apoptosis, such as surface plasmon resonance, electrochemical methods, flow cytometry, and some imaging assays. Among them, the features of simplicity, easy operation, low cost, and high sensitivity make electrochemical techniques powerful tools to investigate electron-transfer processes of in vitro biological systems. In this contribution, a general overview of current knowledge on various technical approaches for apoptosis evaluation is provided. Furthermore, recently developed electrochemical biosensors for detecting apoptotic cells and their advantages over traditional methods are summarized. One of the main considerations focuses on designing the recognition elements based on various biochemical events during apoptosis.

Keywords: apoptosis; biosensors; electrochemistry; enzymes; peptides.