Card Sized V-Chip Runs 50 Different Blood Tests In Seconds Only For 10 Dollars
Normally for a blood test you have to go the pathologist and after giving a sample of your blood you wait for a few hours before you can get your results. In an effort to decrease the waiting time for results, Dr. Lidong Qin and his team of scientists from Houston’s Methodist Hospital Research Institute and MD Anderson Cancer Center have developed a credit card sized gadget known as a volumetric bar-chart chip (V-Chip) which can check for up to 50 different ingredients from just a single drop of blood in a few seconds. As compared to the bulky and expensive devices used to analyse bodily fluids this one is extremely portable and at a price of 10 US dollars is very affordable.
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The V-Chip consists of two thin sheets of glass and a series of 50 tiny wells are sandwiched between them. Each well contains a different type of antibody that has been known to bind to specific protein. The wells also contain an enzyme known as catalase, hydrogen peroxide and a dye. When a drop of blood or any other bodily fluid is placed at one end of the chip, the glass plates are slid against each other to allow the fluid to pass from one well to another. When the antibodies react with specific substances, for instance a substance like insulin, the catalase is activated which in turn converts the hydrogen peroxide into water and oxygen which pushes the dye up in a column linked to the well and is viewed by the user. The higher the column of dye, higher is the amount of substance in the sample. The V-Chip simultaneously shows presence of more than one substance at once like a bar chart. The only drawback of this innovation is that it shows only relative amounts of those substances and for accurate amounts we still have to depend on the expensive instruments. Considering its inexpensive nature this device can be used in developing nations where testing facilities are scarce. The device can also be used in emergency situations such as disaster relief where instant results can help save lives.
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The V-Chip consists of two thin sheets of glass and a series of 50 tiny wells are sandwiched between them. Each well contains a different type of antibody that has been known to bind to specific protein. The wells also contain an enzyme known as catalase, hydrogen peroxide and a dye. When a drop of blood or any other bodily fluid is placed at one end of the chip, the glass plates are slid against each other to allow the fluid to pass from one well to another. When the antibodies react with specific substances, for instance a substance like insulin, the catalase is activated which in turn converts the hydrogen peroxide into water and oxygen which pushes the dye up in a column linked to the well and is viewed by the user. The higher the column of dye, higher is the amount of substance in the sample. The V-Chip simultaneously shows presence of more than one substance at once like a bar chart. The only drawback of this innovation is that it shows only relative amounts of those substances and for accurate amounts we still have to depend on the expensive instruments. Considering its inexpensive nature this device can be used in developing nations where testing facilities are scarce. The device can also be used in emergency situations such as disaster relief where instant results can help save lives.
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