Fast and accurate diagnostics for point-of-care testing

We are pursuing the miniaturization of assays for diagnostic applications where it is desirable to employ very small volumes of samples to detect multiple analytes in parallel and in a minimum amount of time. For example, we work with Patrick Hunziker and colleagues from the University Hospital of Basel and Bühlmann Laboratories AG, an in-vitro diagnostic company, to detect cardiac markers from human samples with high sensitivity and accuracy. The main challenge in this activity is to derive from our earlier work on biopatterning and microfluidics a powerful yet simple device for non-expert users.

This effort is in part supported financially by the Swiss Commission for Innovation and Technology.