Development of mediator-type biosensor to wirelessly monitor whole cholesterol concentration in fish

We developed a wireless monitoring system to monitor fish condition by tracking the change in whole cholesterol concentration. The whole cholesterol concentration of fish is a source of steroid hormones or indicator of immunity level, which makes its detection important for tracking physiological condition of fish. Wireless monitoring system comprises of mediator-type biosensor and wireless transmission device. Biosensor is implantable to fish body, and transmission device is so light, in that fish is allowed to swim freely during monitoring. Cholesterol esterase and oxidase were fixated on to the detection site of biosensor and used to detect the whole cholesterol concentration. However, cholesterol oxidase incorporates oxidation–reduction reaction of oxygen for detection, which concentration fluctuates easily due to change in environmental condition. Meanwhile, mediator-type biosensor enables monitoring of whole cholesterol concentration by using mediator to substitute that oxidation–reduction reaction of oxygen. Characteristic of fabricated mediator-type biosensor was tested. The sensor output current of mediator-type biosensor remained stable compared to output current of non-mediator-type biosensor under fluctuating oxygen concentration of 0–8 ppm, which implied that this sensor is less affected by change in dissolved oxygen concentration. That biosensor was then implanted into fish for wireless monitoring. As a result, approximately 48 h of real-time monitoring was successful.