December 10, 2012 –
Bioengineering professor Amy Herr and BioE graduate student Alex Hughes have published a groundbreaking research in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Herr and Hughes have successfully created a microfluidic Western blot device which can run 48 assays in an hour or less.
The Western blot is a workhorse of biology labs, used to detect specific proteins in a sample of tissue extract. Performed conventionally, the many steps of blotting are time consuming and labor intensive, taking multiple hours per test. Herr developed a microfluidic platform of 48 tiny channels on a microscope slide, requiring only nanoliters of sample fluid.
Once widespread, this technology could significantly increase the speed and efficiency of biological research.
Read more at PNAS, and commentary at the ASBMB Today blog.