A research team from the\nUniversity of Macau (UM) has achieved a new breakthrough. The team has\ndeveloped a fast, accurate, and convenient point-of-care pathogen detection\nmethod with the help of the digital microfluidic system. This method uses\nisothermal DNA amplification together with specific DNA Molecular Beacon probe\non a digital microfluidic chip to detect life-threatening parasite infection.\nIn addition to obtaining fast results in 40 minutes, this method can also lower\nthe reaction volume to one-tenth (1-\u03bcL)\nof the volume required with conventional methods. Discrimination of\nnon-specific amplification and lower risks of aerosol contamination also mean\nthat this system has the potential for clinical applications. The study has\nbeen published in Scientific Reports<\/i>,\na journal under the Nature Publishing Group.\u3000<\/p>\n\n
The research paper is titled \u2018A\nDigital Microfluidic System for Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification and\nSequence Specific Pathogen Detection\u2019. The study was conducted by a\nmultidisciplinary microfluidics research team from UM\u2019s State-Key Laboratory\nof Analog and Mixed-Signal VLSI (AMSV), whose members include Wan Liang, Chen\nTianlan, Gao Jie, Dong Cheng, Jia Yanwei (corresponding author), Mak Pui In,\nand Rui Martins, in collaboration with Ada Wong Hang Heng and Chuxia Deng from\nthe Faculty of Health Sciences. This research study is supported by the Science\nand Technology Development Fund of Macao. The study is based on the core\ntechnology of digital microfluidics developed by the microfluidics team. Their\nresearch fields include microfluidic technologies, portable automatic medical\ndevices for disease diagnostics, and microfluidic devices for cell culture and\ndrug screening. The team established a class-1000 cleanroom in 2015, which\ncovers an area of roughly 60 <\/sup>square metres and is equipped with\nsophisticated instruments that can accomplish various technical tasks,\nincluding soft lithography and nanodeposition, which are essential steps for\ndigital microfluidic chip fabrication.<\/p>\n\n <\/p>\n \n ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A research team from the University of Macau (UM) has achieved a new breakthrough. The team has developed a fast, accurate, and convenient point-of-care pathogen detection method with the help…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47440,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-release"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n