[Courtesy of ETRI]
The new system was developed by the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI). "Conventional test machines are very bulky and sometimes need a whole floor, but our system can be housed in a microwave oven-sized machine. It can be carried to anywhere," ETRI's PR manager Baek ji-heon told Aju News on November 3.
The new system can be modified to diagnose chronic illnesses and other infectious diseases such as food poisoning. ETRI would start clinical tests in 2021 to verify the efficacy of its system and minimize its physical volume.
The system showed the coefficient of variation (CV), a measure that indicates probability dispersion, of 3.4 percent. ETRI's CV is close to top global standards. "This system is appropriate for analyzing various samples quickly and conveniently at medical fields," ETRI's diagnosis platform research section head Heo Chul said in a statement.
The institute used three key technologies, including antibody immobilization applied in the creation of a biochip that uses antibodies to hold on to selected biomarkers from a blood sample for diagnosis. The signal amplification technology increased the reliability of biomarker detection while the rotational motion-based automation technology enabled the quick preparation of blood samples to shorten the time for analysis.
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