Direct Quantitation of SARS-CoV-2 Virus in Urban Ambient Air via a Continuous-Flow Electrochemical Bioassay

Abstract

Airborne SARS-CoV-2 virus surveillance faces challenges in complicated biomarker enrichment, interferences from various non-specific matters and extremely low viral load in the urban ambient air, leading to difficulties in detecting SARS-CoV-2 bioaerosols. This work reports a highly specific bioanalysis platform, with an exceptionally low limit-of-detection (≤1 copy m−3) and good analytical accordance with RT-qPCR, relying on surface-mediated electrochemical signaling and enzyme-assisted signal amplification, enabling gene and signal amplification for accurate identification and quantitation of low doses human coronavirus 229E (HCoV-229E) and SARS-CoV-2 viruses in urban ambient air. This work provides a laboratory test using cultivated coronavirus to simulate the airborne spread of SARS-CoV-2, and validate that the platform could reliably detect airborne coronavirus and reveal the transmission characteristics. This bioassay conducts the quantitation of real-world HCoV-229E and SARS-CoV-2 in airborne particulate matters collected from road-side and residential areas in Bern and Zurich (Switzerland) and Wuhan (China), with resultant concentrations verified by RT-qPCR.