Electrochemiluminescence for the identification of electrochemically active bacteria

Electrochemically active bacteria (EAB) use extracellular electron transfer (EET) to exchange electron with extracellular acceptors. Previous studies regarding the measurement of EAB were based on either extracellular reduction or oxidation. In this work, we developed a simple electrochemiluminescence (ECL) assay for the identification and detection of EAB. The results of this proposed method revealed that EET of EAB influenced the content of dissolved oxygen and the formation of Ru(bpy)₃ ^2+• thus leading to qualitative changes of the ECL signal. EAB with the ability of extracellular reduction (such as Shewanella oneidensis MR-1) gave enhanced signal on ECL emission while those displaying the ability of extracellular oxidation (i.e., Sulfobacillus acidophilus) showed the opposite effect on ECL emission, but non-EAB (i.e., Escherichia coli) did not. These changes in ECL intensity were also proportional to the cell density that could be quantitatively detected in the concentration range of (1.1 ± 1) × 10⁵–212 ± 2 CFU/mL (i.e. Shewanella oneidensis MR-1). Moreover, the measurement of the ability of EAB using this approach was in agreement with measurements using the dissimilatory Fe(III) reduction method. Compared to previous reports, this method displayed a continual and steady ECL signal that allowed accurate measurements of EAB. Most important, only a low cell density was needed in this Ru(bpy)₃ ²⁺ - based ECL method, which is beneficial for cell detection.