Abstract

Molecular Detection of Emerging Pathogens in Low-Resource Settings

Robert Meagher, Principal Member of the Technical Staff, Sandia National Laboratories

The recent Ebola and Zika epidemics highlight challenges associated with pathogen diagnostics in the developing world, particularly logistical challenges with sample transport, availability of resources, and skilled labor. To enable point-of-care diagnostics or distributed pathogen detection, we have developed a user-friendly smartphone-enabled detection unit capable of automating a for reverse transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) detection assay with fluorescence detection.We demonstrate the utility of our device by detecting DNA or RNA from diverse pathogens including Zika, dengue, chikungunya, yellow fever, Lassa, and Ebola viruses, as well as Plasmodium falciparum, in simple consumables such as PCR tubes or flat-bottom microwells. The assays can be performed with minimal sample processing, or even directly from blood, saliva or urine diluted directly into reaction mixtures, and the assay reagents themselves can be dried down and remain stable for at least a month at 40 °C, enabling assays to be performed in almost any setting.