Shifting the Specificity of E. coli Biosensor from Inorganic Arsenic to Phenylarsine Oxide through Genetic Engineering

It has recently been discovered that organic and inorganic arsenics could be detrimental to human health. Although organic arsenic is less toxic than inorganic arsenic, it could form inorganic arsenic through chemical and biological processes in environmental systems. In this regard, the availability of tools for detecting organic arsenic species would be beneficial. Because As-sensing biosensors employing arsenic responsive genetic systems are regulated by ArsR which detects arsenics, the target selectivity of biosensors could be obtained by modulating the selectivity of ArsR. In this study, we demonstrated a shift in the specificity of E. coli cell-based biosensors from the detection of inorganic arsenic to that of organic arsenic, specifically phenylarsine oxide (PAO), through the genetic engineering of ArsR. By modulating the number and location of cysteines forming coordinate covalent bonds with arsenic species, an E. coli cell-based biosensor that was specific to PAO was obtained. Despite its restriction to PAO at the moment, it offers invaluable evidence of the potential to generate new biosensors for sensing organic arsenic species through the genetic engineering of ArsR.