Ramsey Research GroupThe University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Department of Chemistry

Microfluidic Point of Care

A central focus of the Ramsey group is the development of a Reconfigurable Multi-element Diagnostics (ReMeDx) point-of-care platform for the simultaneous analysis of multiple protein or nucleic acid biomarkers. The basis for this assay relies on magnetic beads labeled with different biological recognition elements and fluorescent dyes. By encoding specific beads with a unique element/ dye combination, multiple bead types capable of capturing multiple target analytes can be combined together and incubated with a single sample. The beads can then be stochastically loaded into wells of a microwell array where signal amplification can be performed employing either Single Molecule Array (SiMoA) ELISA-based assays or Singleplex Reactions in a Compact Array (SiRCA) PCR assays. Measuring the fluorescence signal prior to and following amplification determines the presence of a target molecule in a given well along with its identity. Since the numbers of active wells are proportional to the concentrations of analytes in the original sample, the wells with increased fluorescence can simply be counted to quantify the concentrations of the target analytes in the original sample. This analytical approach provides single molecule detection because a single analyte molecule bound to a bead is amplified to provide a strong signal on-chip thereby allowing facile digital detection.

Subgroup Members

William Henley Angie Proctor
Andrew Hoerter David Thrower
Michael Pynn Sokkhen Prom
Vipresh Jain John Perry
Nicole Melchiorre  Xuefei Gao
 Bidhan Dhar  David Korest

subgroup photo