New tool pulls elusive COVID-19 marker from human blood
Researchers create method to measure severity of the pandemic virus

Date:
October 20, 2020
Source:
McMaster University
Summary:
Researchers have created a surface that repels every other element
of human blood except an elusive cytokine critical to understanding
the progress of COVID-19 in individual patients.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
When COVID-19 attacks, the immune system produces a cytokine, or
protein, called Interleukin-6 (IL-6), whose concentrations can offer
vital information about a patient's level and stage of infection.


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But measuring the critical marker has been extremely challenging, given
its nearly undetectable presence in the biological stew that makes up
human blood.

Existing technology has not been accurate or sensitive enough to measure concentrations of IL-6 well enough to be reliable, especially in low concentrations.

Now researchers at McMaster University and SQI Diagnostics have created
a surface that repels every other element of human blood except the
critical cytokine, opening a timely window for understanding the progress
of COVID-19 in individual patients.

The McMaster researchers are working to adapt the technology to the
Toronto company's existing testing platforms, in the hope of moving it
into clinical use as soon as possible. The same biosensing technology
can also be used to measure other infectious and non-infectious diseases, including some cancers.

The innovative surface coating is made to repel every component
of blood and other complex fluids such as urine, but is dotted with
microscopic islands of molecules that attract IL-6, making it possible
to detect and measure IL-6 with unprecedented accuracy and sensitivity,
at concentrations as low as 0.5 picograms per mL -- or one half of
one trillionth of a gram per mL -- making it far more sensitive than
existing technology.

It is the latest application of smart-surface technology to emerge from
the laboratory of Tohid Didar, a mechanical engineering professor at
McMaster who has recently been involved in projects to create a reactive
tag for food packaging that indicates the presence of harmful pathogens,
a form of wrap that can repel antimicrobial-resistant bacteria and a
coating for surgical implants that can repel infection while attracting
cells that promote integration with surrounding tissue.

"There are so many possibilities for these smart surfaces. We can create
them to repel everything, or we can design them to interact in many
beneficial ways," Didar says. "Here, we're looking for something, and only
that one thing, and this allows us to separate it from everything else
in a very complex environment." The new smart surface for detecting IL-6
can be printed inexpensively onto the inside of test tubes and onto other platforms used in diagnostic testing. After a sample of blood is exposed
to the surface and removed, the captured IL-6 can readily be measured.

"The technology was challenging to create, but it is easy to use in
many applications, including in testing kits that already exist," says co-author Amid Shakeri, a PhD student in Didar's lab. "I'm very happy
that we can actually be involved in something that could be important
for humankind, and I'm hopeful we can get this into clinical settings
very soon." "Our partnership with McMaster University has opened up an innovative pathway to a low-cost manufacturing design to enable affordable
and accurate diagnostics, especially for testing in the COVID-19 pandemic"
said Dr. Eric Brouwer, Chief Scientific Officer of SQI Diagnostics.

A paper introducing the technology is published today in the journal
Small.


========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by McMaster_University. This article
was first published on Brighter_World. Read the original_article. Note:
Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Amid Shakeri, Noor Abu Jarad, Jeff Terryberry, Shadman Khan, Ashlyn
Leung, Simeng Chen, Tohid F. Didar. Antibody Micropatterned
Lubricant‐Infused Biosensors Enable Sub‐Picogram
Immunofluorescence Detection of Interleukin 6 in Human Whole Plasma.

Small, 2020; 2003844 DOI: 10.1002/smll.202003844 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201020105536.htm

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