Development of a point-of-care (POC) diagnostic system

Abstract

This report covers the development work of the final year project “The development of a point-of-care Diagnostic system” over the course of 2 semesters. The POC diagnostic system is to be used for the diagnostic of cancerous diseases and infectious diseases using the immunoassays technique, The detection method is based on the innovative Localized Surface Plamonic Resonance (LSPR) with nanosize patterned metal layer on the glass substrate, called the LSPR chip. The LSPR chip is integrated in the microfluidic cartridge with multiple microchannels. The testing cartridge is made in polymer substrate and consists of the inlet chamber, microchannels for fluidic flow control and the reaction chamber s to hold the LSPR chips, as well as the waste chamber to contain the spent biosample and reagents.

The main objective of this project was to develop the first working demo prototype for the intended POC system to evaluate the various ideas that were put together in this project for the first time.

The project was successfully demonstrated with the first working prototype demo system that incorporate the iPhone with App for imaging and communication and the POC system design that allows the transport of bio-samples and reagents through the reaction chambers attached with the LSPR chips in the microfluidic testing cartridge.

Different modules including the microfluidic testing cartridge, portable POC mechanical casing, optical interface, micro-fluidic interface, electronic interface and user interface on the iPhone for the POC system were design and developed and finally assembled to build up the first prototype system for evaluation.