Development of a microfluidic system for measuring HIV-1 viral load.
The World Health Organization (WHO) is rapidly expanding antiretroviral treatment (ART) in sub-Saharan countries. However, virological failure of ART is rarely monitored due to the lack of affordable and sustainable viral load assays suitable for resource-limited settings. Here, we report a prototype of a rapid virus detection method based on microfluidic technologies. In this method, HIV-1 particles from 10 µL whole blood were captured by anti-gp120 antibody coated on the microchannel surface and detected by dual fluorescence signals under microscopy. Next, captured HIV-1 particles were counted using the free software, ImageJ (http://rsbweb.nih.gov/ij/). This rapid HIV-1 detection method has potential to be further developed for viral load monitoring at resource-limited settings.
Bio-Acoustic MEMS in Medicine Laboratory, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Shuqi
S
Wang
Bio-Acoustic MEMS in Medicine Laboratory, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Alexander
A
Ip
Bio-Acoustic MEMS in Medicine Laboratory, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Feng
F
Xu
Infectious Diseases Unit, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, 02114.
Francoise F
FF
Giguel
Bio-Acoustic MEMS in Medicine Laboratory, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Sangjun
S
Moon
Bio-Acoustic MEMS in Medicine Laboratory, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Altug
A
Akay
Section of Retroviral Therapeutics, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA 02115.
Daniel R
DR
Kuritzkes
Bio-Acoustic MEMS in Medicine Laboratory, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA 02139 ; Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Utkan
U
Demirci
Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1); microchip; point-of-care (POC); viral load