Abstract
Frequent outbreaks of foodborne illness have been increasing the awareness of food safety. Conventional methods for pathogen detection and identification are labor-intensive and take days to complete. Some immunological, rapid assays are developed, but these assays still require prolonged enrichment steps. Recently developed biosensors have shown potential for the rapid detection of foodborne pathogens. In this study, an impedimetric biosensor was developed for rapid detection of Salmonella entritidis in food sample. To develop the biosensor, an interdigitated microelectrode (IME) was fabricated by using a semiconductor fabrication process. Anti-Salmonella antibodies were immobilized based on neutravidin-biotin binding on the surface of the IME to form an active sensing layer. To evaluate the effect of electrode gap on sensitivity of the sensor, 3 types of sensors with different electrode gap sizes (2, 5, and $10{\mu}m$) were fabricated and tested. The impedimetric biosensor could detect $10^3\;CFU/mL$ of Salmonella in pork meat extract with an incubation time of 5 min. This method may provide a simple, rapid, and sensitive method to detect foodborne pathogens.