941 research outputs found
Advances in Microfluidics and Lab-on-a-Chip Technologies
Advances in molecular biology are enabling rapid and efficient analyses for
effective intervention in domains such as biology research, infectious disease
management, food safety, and biodefense. The emergence of microfluidics and
nanotechnologies has enabled both new capabilities and instrument sizes
practical for point-of-care. It has also introduced new functionality, enhanced
sensitivity, and reduced the time and cost involved in conventional molecular
diagnostic techniques. This chapter reviews the application of microfluidics
for molecular diagnostics methods such as nucleic acid amplification,
next-generation sequencing, high resolution melting analysis, cytogenetics,
protein detection and analysis, and cell sorting. We also review microfluidic
sample preparation platforms applied to molecular diagnostics and targeted to
sample-in, answer-out capabilities
Automation of environmental ELISAs
ELISAs for pesticides and herbicides in environmental and
agricultural samples are becoming very important in screening
applications [1-3]. Traditional chromatographic methods are
expensive and results need long turnaround times, making them
incompatible with rapid on-site decision making. ELISA methods
have been shown to meet or exceed the performance of gas
chromatography—they offer rapid low-cost analysis, thereby
increasing the frequency of sampling and enhancing data quality.
Automated ELISA workstations allow the full benefit of these kits
to be realized. Sample preparation, reagent pipetting, incubation,
and photometric evaluation can be performed without user
intervention. Reliability is increased through the elimination of
operator error, better accuracy and precision, and often higher speed.
Much larger batch sizes are possible and these systems can provide
sample tracking with report generation for documentation
requirements. In this paper the manual procedures and ELISA
methods are compared and some critical aspects of automating these
ELISA kits are discussed
Electrochemical Readout in Lab-On-Chip Platforms: Overview of State of the Art and Future Perspectives
Lab-on-chip (LoC) platforms are disruptive technologies in analytical chemistry and bioengineering and are known to enable miniaturised and sensitive analysis of complex biological and chemical samples. Electrochemical detection became one of the most explored among several readout methods, hence its versatility, robustness, straightforward execution, sensitivity, and portability. Therefore, this brief review critically examines the principles, applications, and prospects of electrochemical detection in LoC technologies, highlighting its significance in advancing various fields, including clinical diagnostics, environmental monitoring, and drug discovery
The future of NMR-based metabolomics
The two leading analytical approaches to metabolomics are mass spectrometry (MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. Although currently overshadowed by MS in terms of numbers of compounds resolved, NMR spectroscopy offers advantages both on its own and coupled with MS. NMR data are highly reproducible and quantitative over a wide dynamic range and are unmatched for determining structures of unknowns. NMR is adept at tracing metabolic pathways and fluxes using isotope labels. Moreover, NMR is non-destructive and can be utilized in vivo. NMR results have a proven track record of translating in vitro findings to in vivo clinical applications
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