We use cookies to understand how you use our site and to improve your experience. This includes personalizing content and advertising. To learn more, click here. By continuing to use our site, you accept our use of cookies. Cookie Policy.

Features Partner Sites Information LinkXpress hp
Sign In
Advertise with Us
LGC Clinical Diagnostics

Download Mobile App




Smartphone-Powered Microfluidic ‘Lab on a Strip’ Dengue Test More Powerful Than LFT Testing

By LabMedica International staff writers
Posted on 11 Apr 2022
Print article
Image: Dengue test shows new hope for low-cost diagnostics (Photo courtesy of University of Reading)
Image: Dengue test shows new hope for low-cost diagnostics (Photo courtesy of University of Reading)

Dengue fever affects an estimated 400 million people each year. While most cases are mild, dengue infections can lead to significant complications and can be fatal. Dengue can be most severe in children and is a serious health challenge facing half the global population. Now, new ‘lab on a strip’ technology has shown the capability of smartphone-powered tests for dengue fever.

Biomedical technology researchers from the University of Reading (London, UK) have developed the new diagnostic test for research that uses ‘lab on a strip’ technology, which performs 10 or more tests a very small amount of liquid sample (such as blood, urine or saliva). The researchers used a new diagnostic kit called Cygnus to detect dengue fever with significantly improved rates over lateral flow testing kits.

The team trialled the tests alongside already established alternatives and found the new tests showed 82% clinical sensitivity, beating lateral flow testing (74% sensitivity) and matching hospital-based lab diagnostics (83% sensitivity). At the same time, these devices make 10 measurements allowing us to identify which of the four different dengue virus types caused the infection.

“The paper shows exciting potential for the use of the microfluidic ‘lab on a strip’ tests that can be used in conjunction with a smartphone and are more powerful than LFT testing in this case,” said Dr. Sarah Needs, Postdoctoral Research Associate in Microfluidic Antimicrobial Resistance Testing from the University of Reading. “As well as being cheap to produce, the lab on a strip technology allows users to test many different targets at once in one single sample, so it could be useful to detect multiple diseases not just one.”

“While some people might only recently learned of the trade-offs between home vs. lab testing following COVID-19, in many parts of the world rapid lateral flow tests are used for a range of illnesses including dengue,” added Dr. Alexander Edwards, Associate Professor in Biomedical Technology at the University of Reading co-created the lab on a strip technology. “With the Cygnus concept, we are tackling the biggest hurdle for home testing. How do you make something portable that can be cheaply mass produced while still matching laboratory test performance? By designing the microfluidic lab on a strip using mass-production melt-extrusion it is possible to scale up production and produce hundreds of thousands of tests. By recording results with smartphones, which are becoming ubiquitous, we have designed something that could be revolutionary for healthcare.”

Related Links:
University of Reading 

Gold Member
Fully Automated Cell Density/Viability Analyzer
BioProfile FAST CDV
Verification Panels for Assay Development & QC
Seroconversion Panels
New
Silver Member
Verification Panels for Assay Development & QC
Seroconversion Panels
New
HIV-1 Test
HIV-1 Real Time RT-PCR Kit

Print article

Channels

Immunology

view channel
Image: The findings were based on patients from the ADAURA clinical trial of the targeted therapy osimertinib for patients with NSCLC with EGFR-activated mutations (Photo courtesy of YSM Multimedia Team)

Post-Treatment Blood Test Could Inform Future Cancer Therapy Decisions

In the ongoing advancement of personalized medicine, a new study has provided evidence supporting the use of a tool that detects cancer-derived molecules in the blood of lung cancer patients years after... Read more

Microbiology

view channel
Image: Schematic representation illustrating the key findings of the study (Photo courtesy of UNIST)

Breakthrough Diagnostic Technology Identifies Bacterial Infections with Almost 100% Accuracy within Three Hours

Rapid and precise identification of pathogenic microbes in patient samples is essential for the effective treatment of acute infectious diseases, such as sepsis. The fluorescence in situ hybridization... Read more
Copyright © 2000-2025 Globetech Media. All rights reserved.