ABSTRACT
State-of-the-art healthcare amenities are centralized within the urban sectors, and expensive; and thus become unaffordable for the masses. In current days, point-of-care (POC) testing platforms have been emerged as one of the best alternative to the conventional diagnostic modalities.
Recent advancements in miniaturization technologies play a significant impact towards the development of point-of-care testing devices.
In an effort to develop efficient diagnostic platforms, we have explored specifically two devices namely (i) Lab-on-a-Compact-Disc (LOCD) and (ii) Paper-based devices. For the successful delineation for diagnostic purposes, firstly we have illustrated different fluidic functions over these platforms and subsequently elucidated diagnostic applications.
Rheological behavior of blood is greatly dependent on several parameters like cell density, morphology of the cells, plasma chemistry, cellular interactions etc. and also with the diseased conditions as well. Therefore, to understand the diseased conditions particularly hematological disorders, hematodynamics has been investigated within the LOCD platforms. Firstly, to understand the potential diagnostics by utilizing the physical/mechanical cues, the effect of hematocrit level on blood dynamics has been delineated. To realize the effect of hematocrit, dynamical characteristics of blood have been quantified. Thereafter, to comprehend the consequences of such hematological disorders at the cellular level, we quantify the deformation characteristics of red blood cells as a function of hemoglobin content of the blood. To comment about the diseased condition, blood samples covering a wide range of hemoglobin values have been investigated; therefore both the healthy and anemic conditions can be distinguished.
In the second part, paper-based microfluidic devices have been explored. With a vision of developing an efficient, accurate and inexpensive diagnostic platform, 'paper-and-pencil' based devices have been explored. In particular, a 'Y'-shaped device has been designed for the simultaneous quantification of two analytes following a simple colorimetric approach. In order to make this colorimetric detection approach more robust and user-friendly, an on-chip blood separation technique has been elucidated. Furthermore, to manage the concern regarding the non- uniform illumination and image acquisition settings, a relative correction modality has been illustrated. The findings, thus unveil the concerns of developing microfluidic platforms for low cost diagnostic paradigm and hold far reaching implications for on-field deployments.
Keywords: Point-of-care diagnostics, Microfluidics, Lab-on-a-CD (LOCD), Centrifugal force, Hematological disorders, Hemoglobin, Hematocrit, Red blood cells (RBCs), Blood rheology, Cellular deformation, Paper-based microfluidics, 'Paper-and-pencil' device, Capillarity, Multiplexing, Colorimetric detection, Blood plasma, Image processing, Low cost.
