Detection of viruses will now be a child’s play as researchers at the University of Twente have developed an ultrasensitive sensor which acts as a handheld device and can be used for detection of viruses and measure their concentration within a matter of few minutes.
This sensor will be useful in controlling outbreak of deadly diseases such as bird flu and SARS as with it would be very much possible to screen people at airports, hospitals and clinics. In order to make it work all you will need is small samples of blood, saliva or other body fluids.
In this device integrated optics interferometric sensor has been combined with antibody-antigen recognition approach for developing an extremely sensitive and rapid test for detection of virus. This device can be miniaturized and commercialized quite easily. This device will be of great use as the world is still struggling to fight deadly viruses such as bird flu and SARS. Besides the benefits stated above the technology used for developing this device is better when compared with traditional methods such as Polymerase chain reaction.
Via nanowerk
