Portable SPR Imaging Biosensor for Pathogen Detection

Many of the currently available options for food safety testing are expensive, slow, or limited in the range of threats that can be detected. Sending samples back to testing facilities in the United States is too slow and cumbersome to effectively respond to immediate food safety issues. SPR technology has been well-developed as a tool for molecular analysis, so it is relatively mature in terms of detection methods, chemistry and protocols. However, up until now, SPR devices have been primarily limited to large, expensive, benchtop units that require considerable expertise for operation of the devices. What is needed is the development of inexpensive, field-portable SPR devices that are extremely easy to operate in the field. Additionally, the use of a disposable fluidics card format would greatly enhance ease-of-use and device contamination concerns. Resodyn Corporation has made significant progress in developing SPR biosensors, and proposes to develop a field-portable SPR biosensor as a food safety monitoring device. This sensor would be able to detect the presence of multiple pathogens and/or toxins simultaneously at levels relevant to preventing food-borne illness. In addition to determining the presence of pathogens, specific methods are proposed to assess the viability of the pathogens as well.