A Self-Confined Rotational Hydrogel Chemiluminescence Motor Array for Rapid and Sensitive Detection of Bladder Cancer Biomarkers

Abstract

Bladder cancer (BCa) diagnosis urgently requires non-invasive and multi-biomarker sensing technologies. However, conventional biosensors commonly suffer from low mass-transfer efficiency and high missed-diagnosis rates. Although motor systems can enhance mass transport, their applications are often constrained by interfacial interference between propulsion and recognition components, uncontrollable motion trajectories, and boundary-induced motion deadlock. Herein, an interface-separated hydrogel chemiluminescence motor array (HCMA) was constructed. By integrating asymmetric urease modification with buoyancy-enhanced bubbles, the HCMA achieved stable self-confined rotational propulsion with a velocity of 191.5 μm/s. Enabled by a shape-coding strategy for “one shape, one target” parallel recognition, the HCMA realized label-free detection of 3 BCa urinary biomarkers (NMP22, FDP, and BTA) in around 10 min. The limit of detection reaches as low as 36 fg/mL, which is over 3 orders of magnitude lower than that of the static sensing system. Based on the combined screening strategy, this platform achieves a diagnostic sensitivity of 93.3%, a specificity of 95.0%, and an overall diagnostic accuracy of 93.8% for 65 clinical samples. Coupled with a self-developed smartphone mini-program, the HCMA can rapidly output risk assessment results and efficiently discriminate BCa patients from healthy individuals, offering a highly promising tool for early screening of BCa.