Aid on Spreadsheets

Novel protein microarray technologies for affordable and rapid high performance point of care diagnostics of severe infections in low-income settings

Infectious diseases is the major cause of death in low-income countries, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. Rapid tests for Malaria and HIV have in recent years dramatically improved management of patients and are extremely useful where there is no access to laboratories and qualified staff. However, today no rapid tests are available for many of the most serious infectious diseases such as TB and pneumonia, and further the sheer number of rapid tests is becoming untenable financially and practically. We will employ protein microarray technology to allow simultaneous detection of a patient´s antibody-response to a variety of pathogens, where each pathogen´s unique antibody signature allows greatly improved specificity. Our group has recently developed novel microarray formats that through use of certain nitrocellulose substrates and novel nanoparticle-based amplification strategies allow retained accuracy as compared with lab-based assays within 10 minutes of analysis at a fraction of the cost. The main focus of the project is to create a rapid test for reliable determination of active/latent TB in pediatric patients and at the same time detect signatures of a number of other relevant viral, bacterial and parasitic infections. The method development will be done at the Science for Life Laboratory in Stockholm, whereas the field testing will be done in collaboration with partners at the Mbarara hospital in Uganda and the division of Global Health at the Karolinska Institute.

Project ID

SE-0-SE-29-2013-6636-285-12182

Activity status

2 - Implementation

Aid type

D02 - Other technical assistance

% to Uganda

100.00

Organisations

Funding

Sweden

Extending

The Swedish Research Council

Implementing

Kungl Tekniska Högskolan

CRS code	%
Medical research (12182)	100.0