Food allergies pose a significant public health problem and recalls related to undeclared allergens in foods are on the rise, with milk and milk products being the predominant undeclared allergens. The Kokkoli group has designed an aptamer-amphiphile that binds to beta-lactoglobulin, a major allergen from cow’s milk, with high affinity and specificity. The aptamer-amphiphile was used to decorate the interface of a liquid crystal and effectively detected the milk protein at 0.18 ppm, thus demonstrating that it has the potential to be used for the fast and label-free detection of beta-lactoglobulin in food processing facilities. This was in collaboration with the Labuza group in the Department of Food Science and Nutrition at the University of Minnesota.

Read the full paper on Bioconjugate Chemistry. Their work was also featured on one of the journal’s covers