The new device includes external lenses, a filter made of a thin layer, a tiny connector for fine tuning, and a laser diode - all in a small plastic case that can be XNUMXD printed and can be used just like a fluorescent microscope.
![The cell phone-based microscopy device and interface developed at UCLA [courtesy Ozcan Group at UCLA]](https://www.hayadan.org.il/images/content3/2015/06/inline-s-ozcan-group-mercury-phone-and-attachment-2014-500x355.jpg)
Researchers have recently developed a device capable of converting any smartphone into a fluorescent microscope for scanning DNA.
If you think scanning one of these strange QR codes with your phone is super advanced, you're in for a big surprise. Researchers from the University of California in Los Angeles have recently developed a device capable of converting any smartphone into a fluorescent microscope for scanning DNA.
"A single DNA molecule, when it is spread out along its entire length, is 2 nanometers long," said Aydogan Ozcan, a professor at the University of California. "In other words, DNA is 50 thousand times smaller than a human hair. Today, the ability to see individual DNA molecules requires the use of expensive and bulky optical microscopy devices, which are usually found only in advanced laboratories. By comparison, the components of our new device are much cheaper."
The new device includes external lenses, a filter made of a thin layer, a tiny connector for fine tuning, and a laser diode - all contained in a small plastic case that can be XNUMXD printed and can be used just like a fluorescent microscope. Although other smartphones that function as microscopes can image objects on a larger scale, such as cells, the research group's new device is the first capable of showing a thin coil of a single DNA molecule.
The device is intended for use in remote laboratories for the diagnosis of various types of cancer and various neurological diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, as well as for the identification of drug resistance in infectious diseases. In order to use the camera, it is necessary to isolate and label the desired DNA with the help of fluorescent tags. The lead researcher points out that this device can be used even in remote locations and sites with extremely limited resources.
In order to perform the DNA scan itself, the researchers developed a computerized interface and an applet suitable for smart phones. The scanned information is then sent to a remote server located in the researchers' laboratory where they measure the length of the DNA molecules. Assuming there is reliable data communication, processing the entire information takes less than ten seconds.
As part of the study, the scientists tested the device's accuracy by watching fluorescently labeled unfolded DNA segments. The device was able to accurately and reliably measure DNA segments with a length of 10,000 base pairs or more. Many important genes are included in this range, including a bacterial gene that causes infectious diseases and the development of bacterial resistance to antibiotic drugs. The smartphone microscope showed a sharp drop in accuracy for segments of 5,000 base pairs or less, due to low signal-to-noise ratio and contrast for such short segments. The problem can be easily solved by replacing the current lenses with more advanced lenses.
In addition to using the device for diagnostic purposes, the lead researcher notes that the device could also be used for the screening of high molecular weight DNA fragments, those that are a problem within the two-dimensional gel electrophoresis method, a very common method in the fields of biochemistry and molecular biology used to determine the size of DNA and RNA segments.
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