Plastic-Chip-Based Magnetophoretic Immunoassay for Point-of-Care Diagnosis of Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis (TB) remains a relevant infectious disease in the 21st century, and its extermination is still far from being attained. Due to the extreme infectivity of incipient TB patients, a rapid sensing system for proficient point-of-care (POC) diagnostics is required. In our study,, a plastic-chip-based: magnetophoretic immunoassay (pcMPI) is introduced using magnetic and gold nanopartides (NPs).";modified with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) antibodies This pcMPI - offers an ultrasensitive limit of detection (I -.0D) -;of pg-1-01-1 for the detection of CFP40, an MTB-secreted antigen, as a potential TB biomarker with high specificity. In addition, by combining the,plastic chip with an automated spectrophotometer setup, advantages include ease of operation, rapid time to results (1- h), =and cost-effectiveness. Furthermore, the pcMPI results using clinical sputum culture filtrate samples are competitively compared with and integrated With clinical data collected from conventional tools such as the acid -fag bacilli - (AFB) test, nrftobacteriarsrowth indicator tube: (MGIT); polymerase chain reaction -(PCR), and physiological results. CFP-10 concentrations- were consistently higher in patients diagnosed with MTB infeCtion than those seen in patients infected with nontuberculosiS mycobacteria (NTM) (P < 0.05), and this novel test can distinguish MTB and NTM while MGIT cannot. All these results indicate that this pcMPI has the potential to become a new commercial TB diagnostic POC platform in -view of its sensitivity; portability, and affordability.