Cell phone attachment for finding E.Coli invented by UCLA Engineers

A team of scientists at UCLA have invented a cost-effective cell-phone attachment that can detect the presence of bacterium E. Coli which is found in food and water

A team of researchers from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have developed a cost-effective cell-phone based on sensing platform and fluorescent imaging which can detect the presence of Escherichia coli in food and water.

By combining antibody functionalised glass capillaries with quantum dots, this cell-phone attachment will be able to detect E.coli.

Using battery-powered, inexpensive light-emitting diodes (LEDs), the researchers can excite/pump labeled E. coli particles captured on the capillary surface; there, emissions from the quantum dots can be imaged with the cell-phone camera, using an additional
lens inserted between the capillary and the cell phone.

E.coli easily contaminates food and drinking water which poses a major threat to public health even in developing nations. Every year, this species of bacterium causes a big number of hospitalisations and deaths. Just 10 to 100 E.coli particles can kill
cells of the intestinal linings. They can also cause blood clots in brain as well as respiratory failure and seizures.

This study illustrates the promising potential of a cell phone–enabled, field-portable and cost-effective E. coli detection platform for the screening of both water and food samples.

Authors of the research include UCLA electrical engineering postdoctoral scholar Hongying Zhu; UCLA electrical engineering undergraduate student Uzair Sikora; and UCLA associate professor of electrical engineering and bioengineering Aydogan Ozcan. Ozcan
is also a member of the California NanoSystems Institute at UCLA. More on Ozcan’s research group can be found at
http://innovate.ee.ucla.edu.

Ozcan Research Group was funded by the U.S Office of Navel Research, the National Institute of Health, National Science Foundation and the U.S Army Research office.

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Posted by Taimoor Tariq on Feb 26 2012. Filed under Health, Sci-Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry