Fabiana Arduini

Paper as the rediscovered material to develop smart and sustainable electrochemical devices for the defense field

Abstract:

In the field of biosensors, the use of paper has established a new route considering its several features, including its i) capillary-driven flowing pathways avoiding the use of external pumps, ii) capability to work as a reservoir for storing the reagents, delivering a reagent-free analytical tool, iii) capacity to work without sample treatment, i.e. filtration and dilution, iv) flexibility and foldability, boosting the origami configuration easily without any additional device, vi) feature to work as a reactor to synthesized inside nanomaterials by follow a sustainable approach, vii) ability to detect the target analyte not only in solution but also in aerosol and solid samples without any sampling system, and viii) characteristics to design combined hybrid systems to boost easy analysis, overcoming the ongoing limitation using polyester-based printed electrochemical biosensors. The advantages of using paper-based electrochemical biosensors have also been demonstrated in the defense field. In this presentation, I report the research activity carried out in my group for the measurement of chemical warfare agents namely nerve agents and mustard agents as well as the biological warfare agents namely botulinum toxins by using paper-based printed electrochemical biosensors. In addition, the results focused on paper-based point-of-care devices, including wearable ones, to support the evaluation of people exposed to cholinesterase inhibitors e.g. nerve agents, or to evaluate the stress level of the soldier will be presented.

Biography: