Image Processing and Cell Phone Microscopy to Analyze the Immunomagnetic Beads on Micro-Contact Printed Gratings

Abstract

Abstract:In this paper we report an ultra-low-cost spherical ball lens based cell phone microscopy and image processing algorithms to analyze the amount of immunomagnetic beads on micro-contact printed gratings. The spherical ball lens provides approximately 100× magnification but the recorded images are not clear and are noisy. By using the image-processing algorithms, the noise can be reduced and the images can be enhanced to quantify the amount of immunomagnetic beads on micro-contact printed lines. This method, which is portable and low-cost, can be an alternative read out mechanism for biosensing applications using immunomagnetic beads on micro-contact printed surface receptors. Further, 0.0335 mg/mL was the lowest magnetic bead concentration that could be detected above the inherent noise level of the spherical ball lens.

Detection of Proteins Using Nano Magnetic Particle Accumulation-Based Signal Amplification

“…The CNR measurements reveal that added iron nano particles accumulate around the base beads and act as contrast agents to enhance the signal. This signal enhancement on the chip has the potential to be integrated with simpler signal readout systems such as cellphone microscopy [30], and thus can be used in devices for point-of-care diagnostics. Figure 5 shows an image of the control experiment where 0 nM streptavidin was used, and biotin-coated magnetic beads were washed away from the surface.…”