Microfluidics: Emerging Tool in Point-of-Care Testing

Dear Colleagues,

The current diagnostic instrumentation requires complex infrastructure, trained personnel, long processing time, and expensive reagents, most of these elements being unavailable in countries with low incomes. Point-of-care (POC) diagnostic devices may simplify the healthcare process and improve clinical outcomes to speed up a large number of medical tests. The main advantages of POC systems rely on their cost/time efficiency, portability, sensitivity/specificity, and user-friendliness. These characteristics make possible the use of POC systems, especially in low- and middle-income countries. A crucial aspect for the future of POC technologies is microfluidics, primarily due to its intrinsic features such as low consumption of reagents and sample, miniaturization of the device, and fast turnaround time for analysis. Recently, POC devices incorporating both disposable sensors and microfluidic modules became commercially available (Metrika, Biosite, iSTAT, Bosch, and Unipath). The POC market is estimated to be over $10 billion, with sensitive growth in the coming years. This Special Issue of Micromachines targets recent technologies and device advancements in point-of-care microfluidic-based diagnostics. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Basic microfluidics tools involved in POC testing (materials, fabrication, surface modification, detection techniques)
• New detection strategies
• Applications in nucleic acid-based molecular diagnostics
• Applications in immunoassays and clinical chemistry
• Applications in a single cell and cell analysis
• Applications in food safety
• Applications in global health.

Dr. Ciprian Iliescu
Prof. Dr. Pavel Neuzil
Dr. Yi Zhang
Guest Editors

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