From http://www.birdflubreakingnews.com/
Today, 12:00 AM The H5N1 Lab-on-a - chip test
Story from:
Radio Singapore International (Mediacorp Radio)
http://www.birdflubreakingnews.com/...english/frontiers/view/20071016171344/1/.html
Frontiers
The H5N1 Lab-on-a-chip test
October 16, 2007
Welcome to Frontiers with me, Loretta Foo.
As of September 2007, bird flu has accounted for 200 deaths out of 328 confirmed cases world wide. While the number may seem small, these statistics are merely the tip of the iceberg because of the difficulty in confirming the presence of the H5N1 bird flu virus. Furthermore, many are predicting that the H5N1 virus will not only be able to spread from animal to human but from human to human in future.
Amidst all this, scientists in Singapore have offered a beam of hope in the frantic race against the virus, with a new test that can detect the H5N1 flu strain within 30 minutes, without the need to ship the sample to one of only 200 qualified labs internationally.
Dr Jurgen Pipper is the project leader of the team that comes from the Institute of Bio-engineering in Singapore. He tells us that the device relies on two technologies. The first part of the test purifies the raw samples taken from the test subject.
JP: Say you take it from the throat swab, blood or urine and this equipment is necessary to purify RNA or DNA from the sample. If the sample is purified, you have another machine would is called a thermocycler and it can run a so-called polymerase chain reaction, a reaction that will amplify trace amounts of DNA to detectable levels. So all this equipment has to come together and typically, it?s heavy and costly and it has to be operated by a lab officer at least. What we have done is miniaturised all the lab components into a ?lab-on-a-chip?.
The test has been proven to be 10 times faster, 40 to 100 times cheaper and is as sensitive as conventional tests. This makes it a valuable tool in the fight against bird flu, especially in poorer countries which cannot afford expensive laboratory testing.
JP: At the moment, it?s something like this. The sample has to come to the lab and if it?s small and portable, the device can go to the sample. So you go to the chicken farm for example and check chickens for bird flu every day or every hour even. You can do this with people so it?s just flexible, especially in regions where there is no power supply because again, small equipment means less power consumed.
IBN has developed a technique that uses magnetic force to manipulate individual droplets containing silica-coated magnetic particles, allowing the test to be shrunk into a palm-sized device.
JP: What we have done so far is proof of concept. It works quite well in the lab but this does not necessarily mean it will be perfect in the field. There are still a lot of other details. For example, designing a special cartridge where all the components are contained, maybe in a freeze dried form so we don?t need a fridge because biochemicals are quite sensitive to heat. This also needs to be developed because at the moment, we are only able to trace one particular strain. What we would like to do is multiplexing, that means there are several channels which would allow us to distinguish if it is a normal flu or bird flu.
Besides being used to detect H5N1, Dr Pipper says that the test can be used to detect many other diseases as well.
JP: In general, you can copy every DNA to detect levels so you have your DNA and I have my DNA which are all different. It?s the same with the viral RNA or bacterial DNA, so a virus or a bacterium, they would have different sequences. You can then define the sequence you want to amplify by choosing the right primer and they are specific for what you are looking for. You can develop a special primer for every strain of dengue, for Hepatitis B, to distinguish if you are male or female.
In a disaster scenario like the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome epidemic which spread throughout Singapore in 2003, this test would be on the frontline of defence.
JP: Just imagine that someone in your office has the flu and how long does it take for you to develop symptoms? Maybe two or three days and then you start getting fever. What is really important in infectious diseases, especially flu is to detect it really fast and then contain it. So imagine now, your classroom or office is contaminated with this virus, you just need to close down the whole office with the people inside. With the people inside, you?d let no one out and then you can contain the flu just within the office so that it doesn?t spread throughout Singapore. It has to be fast and if you have a lot of individuals, it has to be cheap and that is what we have achieved, we are fast and cheap.
Dr Jurgen Pipper, project leader of the team from the Institute of Bioengineering in Singapore. This has been Frontiers with me, Loretta Foo only on Radio Singapore International.
Today, 12:00 AM The H5N1 Lab-on-a - chip test
Story from:
Radio Singapore International (Mediacorp Radio)
http://www.birdflubreakingnews.com/...english/frontiers/view/20071016171344/1/.html
Frontiers
The H5N1 Lab-on-a-chip test
October 16, 2007
Welcome to Frontiers with me, Loretta Foo.
As of September 2007, bird flu has accounted for 200 deaths out of 328 confirmed cases world wide. While the number may seem small, these statistics are merely the tip of the iceberg because of the difficulty in confirming the presence of the H5N1 bird flu virus. Furthermore, many are predicting that the H5N1 virus will not only be able to spread from animal to human but from human to human in future.
Amidst all this, scientists in Singapore have offered a beam of hope in the frantic race against the virus, with a new test that can detect the H5N1 flu strain within 30 minutes, without the need to ship the sample to one of only 200 qualified labs internationally.
Dr Jurgen Pipper is the project leader of the team that comes from the Institute of Bio-engineering in Singapore. He tells us that the device relies on two technologies. The first part of the test purifies the raw samples taken from the test subject.
JP: Say you take it from the throat swab, blood or urine and this equipment is necessary to purify RNA or DNA from the sample. If the sample is purified, you have another machine would is called a thermocycler and it can run a so-called polymerase chain reaction, a reaction that will amplify trace amounts of DNA to detectable levels. So all this equipment has to come together and typically, it?s heavy and costly and it has to be operated by a lab officer at least. What we have done is miniaturised all the lab components into a ?lab-on-a-chip?.
The test has been proven to be 10 times faster, 40 to 100 times cheaper and is as sensitive as conventional tests. This makes it a valuable tool in the fight against bird flu, especially in poorer countries which cannot afford expensive laboratory testing.
JP: At the moment, it?s something like this. The sample has to come to the lab and if it?s small and portable, the device can go to the sample. So you go to the chicken farm for example and check chickens for bird flu every day or every hour even. You can do this with people so it?s just flexible, especially in regions where there is no power supply because again, small equipment means less power consumed.
IBN has developed a technique that uses magnetic force to manipulate individual droplets containing silica-coated magnetic particles, allowing the test to be shrunk into a palm-sized device.
JP: What we have done so far is proof of concept. It works quite well in the lab but this does not necessarily mean it will be perfect in the field. There are still a lot of other details. For example, designing a special cartridge where all the components are contained, maybe in a freeze dried form so we don?t need a fridge because biochemicals are quite sensitive to heat. This also needs to be developed because at the moment, we are only able to trace one particular strain. What we would like to do is multiplexing, that means there are several channels which would allow us to distinguish if it is a normal flu or bird flu.
Besides being used to detect H5N1, Dr Pipper says that the test can be used to detect many other diseases as well.
JP: In general, you can copy every DNA to detect levels so you have your DNA and I have my DNA which are all different. It?s the same with the viral RNA or bacterial DNA, so a virus or a bacterium, they would have different sequences. You can then define the sequence you want to amplify by choosing the right primer and they are specific for what you are looking for. You can develop a special primer for every strain of dengue, for Hepatitis B, to distinguish if you are male or female.
In a disaster scenario like the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome epidemic which spread throughout Singapore in 2003, this test would be on the frontline of defence.
JP: Just imagine that someone in your office has the flu and how long does it take for you to develop symptoms? Maybe two or three days and then you start getting fever. What is really important in infectious diseases, especially flu is to detect it really fast and then contain it. So imagine now, your classroom or office is contaminated with this virus, you just need to close down the whole office with the people inside. With the people inside, you?d let no one out and then you can contain the flu just within the office so that it doesn?t spread throughout Singapore. It has to be fast and if you have a lot of individuals, it has to be cheap and that is what we have achieved, we are fast and cheap.
Dr Jurgen Pipper, project leader of the team from the Institute of Bioengineering in Singapore. This has been Frontiers with me, Loretta Foo only on Radio Singapore International.