New lab-on-a-chip system for the infectious disease analysis

With the new microfluidic-based system pathogens of various infectious diseases can be analysed from nasopharyngeal swab samples. The cost-efficient credit card sized lab-on-a-chip system (LoC) - which was developed within a BMBF-funded project - allows to perform complex molecular diagnostic process steps directly at the point-of care in roughly 60 minutes total process time.
 
During this project IMM developed the microfluidic system for the analysis of nucleic acids of the respective pathogens within nasopharyngeal swab samples in close cooperation with QIAGEN. This system consists of a disposable analysis chip comprising structures for sample extraction, enrichment, amplification and labelling of the nucleic acids for subsequent detection in a Luminex system. In parallel, an operating device was established which allows to run the required assay steps in the LoC automatically. The core of the device is a construction based on rotating heating bars that allows for fast cycling times. All chemicals needed are either stored dry on the single-use disposable microfluidic chip or in a separate reagent storage cartridge that allows performance of 24 analyses.

First tests with the realised functional model revealed that the overall performance of the chip system is comparable with standard lab procedures whereas there are differences in the efficiency of the individual steps.
("LabonaChip", BMBF reference number V3BIO015)

Institut für Mikrotechnik Mainz (IMM)
Dr. Stefan Kiesewalter
kiesewalter@imm-mainz.de
www.imm-mainz.de