1. Portable and Label-Free Quantitative Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification (LF-qLamp) for Reliable COVID-19 Diagnostics in Three Minutes of Reaction Time: Arduino-Based Detection System Assisted by a pH Microelectrode.
- Author
-
Alvarez MM, Bravo-González S, González-González E, and Trujillo-de Santiago G
- Subjects
- COVID-19 virology, Coronavirus Nucleocapsid Proteins genetics, Humans, Microelectrodes, Molecular Diagnostic Techniques instrumentation, Nucleic Acid Amplification Techniques instrumentation, Phosphoproteins genetics, Point-of-Care Systems, RNA, Viral analysis, RNA, Viral metabolism, Reaction Time, SARS-CoV-2 isolation & purification, Saliva virology, COVID-19 diagnosis, Molecular Diagnostic Techniques methods, Nucleic Acid Amplification Techniques methods, SARS-CoV-2 genetics
- Abstract
Loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) has been recently studied as an alternative method for cost-effective diagnostics in the context of the current COVID-19 pandemic. Recent reports document that LAMP-based diagnostic methods have a comparable sensitivity and specificity to that of RT-qPCR. We report the use of a portable Arduino-based LAMP-based amplification system assisted by pH microelectrodes for the accurate and reliable diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 during the first 3 min of the amplification reaction. We show that this simple system enables a straightforward discrimination between samples containing or not containing artificial SARS-CoV-2 genetic material in the range of 10 to 10,000 copies per 50 µL of reaction mix. We also spiked saliva samples with SARS-CoV-2 synthetic material and corroborated that the LAMP reaction can be successfully monitored in real time using microelectrodes in saliva samples as well. These results may have profound implications for the design of real-time and portable quantitative systems for the reliable detection of viral pathogens including SARS-CoV-2.
- Published
- 2021
- Full Text
- View/download PDF