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Hepatitis B virus (HBV) still remains a major global public health problem. One-half to one-third of the total HBV infected people died due to late detection of HBV. Serological antigen and viral HBV detections can help in the diagnosis, referral, and treatment of HBV. Available methods for HBV detection mostly used bulky instruments. Miniaturization of devices for HBV detection has been started by narrowing down the size of the devices. Several methods have also been proposed to increase the selectivity and sensitivity of the miniaturized methods, such as sandwich recognition of the biomarkers and the use of nano- to micro-sized materials. This review presents recent HBV detections in the last two decades from laboratory-based instruments towards microfluidic paper-based analytical devices ( µ PADs) for point-of-care testing (POCT) purposes. Early and routine analysis to detect HBV as early as possible could be achieved by POCT, especially for areas with limited access to a central laboratory and/or medical facilities., Competing Interests: All authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Aulia A. Tyas et al.)

A novel three-dimensional DNA-AuNPs network structure amplification strategy was employed to design a lateral flow biosensor by introducing streptavidin coated gold nanoparticles (Au-SA) in this paper. They act as amplification probes which aggregate numerous gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) on test line by forming a three-dimensional DNA-AuNPs network structure in the presence of target. Sensitive detection of nucleic acid with point-of-care analysis is significant for infectious agent, early diagnosis and treatment of genetic diseases. The use of these particles in rapid ultrasensitive point of care (POC) lateral flow assays lead to a linear range from 0.1pM to 250nM with a limit of detection of 0.01 pM without polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The proposed method could increase the sensitivity by 4 orders of magnitudes than traditional sandwich assays labeled with AuNPs. Furthermore, the assay owns good reproducibility and stability, which will prove practical diagnostic applications., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

We present a low cost, simple and integrated device for medical diagnostics in low-resource settings called the lab-in-a-pen. Finger pricking, and sample collection and processing, are integrated with commercially available paper-based assays in a pen format. This approach ensures safety (i.e. biological sample and sharps containment) and can be used by untrained end users across multiple settings. The pen format also leverages existing low cost, high volume manufacturing and assembly methods. We characterize sample wicking in the lab-in-a-pen using porcine whole blood. The clinical diagnostic utility and usability of the lab-in-a-pen is established by testing of patients for Hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) and Hepatitis B 'e' antigen (HBeAg) by medical staff at the National Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Using ELISA and immunoblotting, autoantibodies to vimentin were sought in sera from 10 patients with acute hepatitis A, 10 with acute hepatitis B, 13 with acute non-A, non-B hepatitis, 16 with autoimmune chronic active hepatitis, 17 with cytomegalovirus infection and 40 from healthy persons. The ELISA results were expressed as a percentage of the value obtained with a monoclonal antibody to vimentin. The results (mean and SD) for acute hepatitis A (51.2 +/- 21.7%), acute hepatitis B (44.5 +/- 28.2%) and acute hepatitis non-A, non-B (43.0 +/- 16.4%) were significantly (p less than 0.01) higher than those for autoimmune chronic active hepatitis (20.5 +/- 7.7%), cytomegalovirus infection (25.9 +/- 12.2%) and healthy controls (16.8 +/- 9.3%). Immunoblotting showed that sera from patients with acute viral hepatitis reacted with 57 kd vimentin in triton-cytoskeletal extracts of fibroblasts. These results show that autoantibodies to vimentin are present in sera from patients with acute hepatitis A, B and non-A, non-B. Antivimentin autoantibodies may be useful in the diagnosis of acute non-A, non-B hepatitis.