Clean sport competition is of significant concern to many governments and sporting organizations. Highly sensitive and rapid sensors are needed to improve the detection of performance enhancing drugs in sports as athletes take diuretics to dilute the concentration of drugs in their urine and microdose under the detectable limits of current sensors. Here we demonstrate, using frequency locked microtoroid optical resonators, a three order of magnitude improvement in detection limit over the current gold standard, mass spectrometry, for the common performance enhancing drug, human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). hCG, also known as the pregnancy hormone, was detected both in simulated urine and in the urine of pregnant donors at a concentration of 1 and 3 femtomolar, respectively. We anticipate that the sensitivity provided by frequency locked optical microcavities can enable a new standard in anti-doping research.The use of performance enhancing drugs during athletic events is prohibited by the World Anti-Doping Association (WADA). To monitor the use of these drugs, anti-doping drug tests are routinely performed during athletic events 1,2 . These tests can detect minute quantities of chemicals from bodily fluids, such as blood or urine. Mass spectrometry is currently the gold standard 3,4 for detecting various doping agents; however, it can have insufficient limits of detection 5 , requires a trained operator, involves specialized enzymes, 6,7 and can be expensive, costing in excess of 100 dollars per assay.
Unilateral vocal fold paralysis (UVP) occurs related to recurrent laryngeal nerve (RLN) impairment associated with impaired swallowing, voice production, and breathing functions. The majority of UVP cases occur subsequent to surgical intervention with approximately 12-42% having no known cause for the disease (i.e., idiopathic). Approximately two-thirds of those with UVP exhibit left-sided injury with the average onset at ≥50 yr of age in those diagnosed as idiopathic. Given the association between the RLN and the subclavian and aortic arch vessels, we hypothesized that changes in vascular tissues would result in increased aortic compliance in patients with idiopathic left-sided UVP compared with those without UVP. Gated MRI data enabled aortic arch diameter measures normalized to blood pressure across the cardiac cycles to derive aortic arch compliance. Compliance was compared between individuals with left-sided idiopathic UVP and age- and sex-matched normal controls. Three-way factorial ANOVA test showed that aortic arch compliance ( = 0.02) and aortic arch diameter change in one cardiac cycle ( = 0.04) are significantly higher in patients with idiopathic left-sided UVP compared with the controls. As previously demonstrated by other literature, our finding confirmed that compliance decreases with age ( < 0.0001) in both healthy individuals and patients with idiopathic UVP. Future studies will investigate parameters of aortic compliance change as a potential contributor to the onset of left-sided UVP. Unilateral vocal fold paralysis results from impaired function of the recurrent laryngeal nerve (RLN) impacting breathing, swallowing, and voice production. A large proportion of adults suffering from this disorder have an idiopathic etiology (i.e., unknown cause). The current study determined that individuals diagnosed with left-sided idiopathic vocal fold paralysis exhibited significantly greater compliance than age- and sex-matched controls. These seminal findings suggest a link between aortic arch compliance levels and RLN function.
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