An optofluidic maskless photopolymerization process was developed for in situ negatively charged nanoporous hydrogel ͓poly-AMPS ͑2-acrylamido-2-methyl-1-propanesulfonic acid͔͒ fabrication. The optofluidic maskless lithography system, which combines a high power UV source and digital mirror device, enables fast polymerization of arbitrary shaped hydrogels in a microfluidic device. The poly-AMPS hydrogel structures were positioned near the intersections of two microchannels, and were used as a cation-selective filter for biological sample preconcentration. Preconcentration dynamics as well as the fabricated polymer shape were analyzed in three-dimensions using fluorescein sample and a confocal microscope. Finally, single-stranded DNA preconcentration was demonstrated for polymerase chain reaction-free signal enhancement.
The Disc Agarose Channel (DAC) system utilizes microfluidics and imaging technologies and is fully automated and capable of tracking single cell growth to produce Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) drug susceptibility testing (DST) results within 3~7 days. In particular, this system can be easily used to perform DSTs without the fastidious preparation of the inoculum of MTB cells. Inoculum effect is one of the major problems that causes DST errors. The DAC system was not influenced by the inoculum effect and produced reliable DST results. In this system, the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values of the first-line drugs were consistent regardless of inoculum sizes ranging from ~103 to ~108 CFU/mL. The consistent MIC results enabled us to determine the critical concentrations for 12 anti-tuberculosis drugs. Based on the determined critical concentrations, further DSTs were performed with 254 MTB clinical isolates without measuring an inoculum size. There were high agreement rates (96.3%) between the DAC system and the absolute concentration method using Löwenstein-Jensen medium. According to these results, the DAC system is the first DST system that is not affected by the inoculum effect. It can thus increase reliability and convenience for DST of MTB. We expect that this system will be a potential substitute for conventional DST systems.
Antibiotic resistance is a global threat to modern society. Rapid determination of proper antibiotics that inhibit bacterial growth can effectively reduce antibiotic resistance and improve clinical treatment. The conventional methods...
Background: Timely intervention in the treatment of bloodstream infection is important for prescription of appropriate antimicrobials. With prompt determination of the antimicrobial susceptibility of a causative agent, rapid antimicrobial susceptibility test (AST) can help select the appropriate antimicrobial therapy. This clinical study is for evaluation of the clinical performance of the QMAC-dRAST for rapid AST directly from positive blood culture (PBC)s with Gram-positive cocci. Methods: A total of 115 PBC samples with Grampositive organisms (76 Staphylococcus spp. and 39 Enterococcus spp.) were evaluated by the QMACdRAST system, and their pure culture isolates were evaluated by the MicroScan WalkAway (Beckman Coulter, USA) as the comparative AST system. Thirteen antimicrobial agents were included, and the agreement and discrepancy rates of the QMACdRAST system (Quantamatrix Inc., Republic of Korea) compared to the MicroScan WalkAway were calculated. To resolve discrepancies, the broth microdilution method was performed.
Results:The QMAC-dRAST system exhibited a categorical agreement rate of 94.9% (1,126/1,187) and an essential agreement rate of 98.3% (1,167/1,187). The QMAC-dRAST system yielded very major (falsesusceptible) errors at 1.0% (5/485), major (false-resistant) errors at 1.3% (9/693), and minor errors at 4.0% (47/1,187) compared to the MicroScan WalkAway. The QMAC-dRAST system significantly eliminated 30 hours of total turnaround time by combination of direct inoculation of PBC and an image-based approach.
Conclusion:The results of the QMAC-dRAST system were highly accurate. Thereby, the QMAC-dRAST may provide essential information to accelerate therapeutic decisions for earlier and adequate antibiotic treatment and patient management in clinical settings.
We have developed magnetically controllable gold nanoparticles by synthesizing superparamagnetic Fe 3 O 4 core/gold shell nanoparticles. The core/shell particles have the capability of forming gold 1D chains in the presence of an external magnetic field. Here we demonstrate dynamic and reversible self-assembly of the gold 1D chain structures in an aqueous solution without any templates or physical or chemical attachment. The spatial configuration of gold chains can be arbitrarily manipulated by controlling the direction of a magnetic field. This technique can provide arbitrary manipulation of gold 1D chains for fabrication purpose. To demonstrate this capability, we present a technique for immobilization of the gold particle chains on a glass substrate.
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