Esmailpour Mahboube, Mohammadimasoudi Mohammad, Shemirani Mohammadreza G, Goudarzi Ali, Heidari Beni Mohammad-Hossein, Shahsavarani Hosein, Aghajan Hamid, Mehrbod Parvaneh, Salehi-Vaziri Mostafa, Fotouhi Fatemeh
Nano-bio-photonics Laboratory, Faculty of New Sciences and Technologies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.
Department of Electrical Engineering, Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran.
Biosens Bioelectron X. 2022 Dec;12:100233. doi: 10.1016/j.biosx.2022.100233. Epub 2022 Sep 8.
We report a label-free method for detection of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in nasopharyngeal swab samples without purification steps and multiplication of the target which simplifies and expedites the analysis process. The kit consists of a textile grid on which liquid crystals (LC) are deposited and the grid is placed in a crossed polarized microscopy. The swab samples are subsequently placed on the LCs. In the presence of a particular biomolecule, the direction of LCs changes locally based on the properties of the biomolecule and forms a particular pattern. As the swab samples are not perfectly purified, image processing and machine learning techniques are employed to detect the presence of specific molecules or quantify their concentrations in the medium. The method can differentiate negative and positive COVID-19 samples with an accuracy of 96% and also differentiate COVID-19 from influenza types A and B with an accuracy of 93%. The kit is portable, simple to manufacture, convenient to operate, cost effective, rapid and sensitive. The simplicity of the specimen processing, the speed of image acquisition, and fast diagnostic operations enable the deployment of the proposed technique for performing extensive on-spot screening of COVID-19 in public places.
我们报告了一种无需纯化步骤和目标扩增即可检测鼻咽拭子样本中SARS-CoV-2病毒的无标记方法，该方法简化并加快了分析过程。该试剂盒由一个沉积有液晶（LC）的纺织网格组成，该网格放置在交叉偏振显微镜中。随后将拭子样本放置在液晶上。在特定生物分子存在的情况下，液晶的方向会根据生物分子的特性局部改变，并形成特定图案。由于拭子样本未经过完美纯化，因此采用图像处理和机器学习技术来检测特定分子的存在或量化其在培养基中的浓度。该方法能够以96%的准确率区分COVID-19阴性和阳性样本，还能以93%的准确率区分COVID-19与甲型和乙型流感。该试剂盒便于携带、制造简单、操作方便、成本效益高、快速且灵敏。样本处理的简便性、图像采集的速度以及快速诊断操作使得所提出的技术能够用于在公共场所对COVID-19进行广泛的现场筛查。
