Miniaturization Advances Rapid, One-Step Diagnostics

Posted on 2009-11-27 06:00:00 in Diagnostics | Nanotechnology |

In that miniaturization based on microfluidics is an emerging future development area for medical diagnostics, Emmanuel Delamarche and Luc Gervais from IBM Research (Switzerland) have developed a tiny chip based on silicon that could be used to diagnose dozens of diseases. The chip draws a small drop of blood via capillary action (small channels under its own force).  By way of an array of antibody molecules that are designed to latch on to the protein-based molecular markers of disease in blood, the chip then  identifies markers of disease.  This miniaturized lab on a chip assesses C-Reactive Protein, a marker of inflammation, in as little as three minutes. 

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Luc Gervais,  Emmanuel Delamarche. “Toward one-step point-of-care immunodiagnostics using capillary-driven microfluidics and PDMS substrates.”   Lab Chip, 2009, 9, 3330; DOI: 10.1039/b906523g.

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