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May 29^th – Diagnostics in your mobile phone. Ikerland leads an European project that will be a referent in regard to the miniaturization of biological assays

ARRASATE. DV. Ikerlan IK4 has host the first meeting between experts from related fields such as clinical medicine, molecular biology, the environment and micro-nanotechnologies. This meeting is the beginning of the European project Labonfoil (lab on a slide), approved with a budget of 7.2 million Euros and 15 partners.

This project arises as a consequence of the excellent results obtained by a previous European project (Optolabcard) in which Gaiker and Ikerland also participate. In that project they develop a device for rapid diagnostic in a size of a laptop computer made to detect the presence of Salmonella spp. and Campylobacter spp. in humans and poultry farms.

This new project (www.labonfoil.eu), again led by Ikerlan and in which also participes Gaiker, will develop the concept SmartBioPhoneT, a mobile phone that incorporates a laboratory on a chip, this provides portability, speed and low cost on several diagnostic areas such as health, environmental and food safety.

On the one hand, the emergence of new pathogens or virus causes a serious public health threat because it is very difficult to stop its expansion due to the increase of human mobility and goods around the world. This fact is compounded by the need for a device that allows monitoring of the disease in the patient's home or in the focus to analyze. These two requirements will be met by this project, because the SmartBioPhoneT is a portable analytical instrument that will detect RNA, DNA and molecular markers.

Therefore, the user who is not expert in biological analysis will simply have to put a sample into a device with a size of a credit card where the complex biological assay is done. The results will be captured by a special accessory into the phone, which then sends this information to the central, all within an interval of 15 minutes.

Besides the obvious saving of time, this system will allow the distribution of diagnostic tools in infectious focus or contaminants, as well as, analytical testing outside the hospital to bring the system to the patient instead of bringing the patient to the hospital.

Applications submitted by Labonfoil are varied and specific to demonstrate its applicability in several fields. On the one hand it will offer to the scientists who study climate change, a tool that will report on the type of algae in the sea. As well it will distinguish between various species of Salmonella and Campylobacter in slaughterhouses and farms. Also it will be use to monitor the evolution of colon cancer.

Finally, a new version will be create to reads a skin patch for the detection of cocaine use through sweat collected during a week in professional drivers.

The duration of this project is for 4 years, is co-funded by the 7PM of European Union and includes 15 organizations like the foundation BIOEF and some Spanish companies like BIOTOOLS and Gema Medical SL).

News Media: diariovasco.com - May 29th 2009