“The paper describes novel methods for fabricating fully integrated PCR-CE devices using glass substrates.”

This paper describes a method for fully integrating nanoliter-volume DNA amplification (PCR) with capillary electrophoresis (CE) microchannels. It is the first paper to demonstrate integration of microfabricated heaters and temperature sensors within glass PCR-CE microsystems. These devices operate rapidly, performing amplification and separation in only 30 minutes. Finally, we demonstrate the feasibility of performing forensic identification from human genomic DNA in such systems, amplifying from only 10 ng of template as might be found in actual forensic investigations.

The paper describes novel methods for fabricating fully integrated PCR-CE devices using glass substrates. The ability to directly fabricate heaters and temperature sensors within the device allows very rapid temperature transitions, up to 20 degrees C/second. The resulting systems can therefore perform PCR and analyze the results within 30 minutes.

The fields of forensics, epidemiology, clinical diagnostics, and many others all use DNA amplification as a central method of sample preparation and experimentation. Unfortunately, conventional methods for DNA amplification are slow and cumbersome and the methods to analyze the results are often slow and lack the resolution to discriminate closely related outcomes. Rapid amplification of genetic material directly combined with high-sensitivity analysis is therefore a critical need in many areas of biological and medical science. Our device accomplishes this combination in a single microfabricated system. It is capable of analyzing very small volumes (200 nanoliters, or two-tenths of a millionth of a liter) and very low concentrations (down to about 1,000 DNA molecules) of genetic material in only minutes, and is therefore poised to contribute greatly to the fields mentioned above.

I was lucky to have had a good high school education, one facet of which was an excellent class in biotechnology. This first interested me in DNA analysis. Later work in biology laboratories as an undergraduate cemented my fascination with this field, and I decided to pursue it in graduate school. Overall, the work has been enormously successful—there are always periods of frustration and setbacks in scientific research, but working through these times usually helps point the way forward.

I am hopeful that these systems can be used to contribute to the equalization of health care around the world. There is currently an urgent need for field-portable genetic analysis systems, particularly in places where routine medical care is lacking. Portable, low-power, and disposable systems would allow medical personnel to diagnose and treat disease in one visit, rather than the current system, which can result in partial care or failed follow-up attempts. In more developed countries, point-of-care medicine is also important, but it is my hope that these systems can be extended to allow personalized medicine, the idea of tailoring a treatment regimen to the particular genetic and environmental make-up of an individual patient. Such personalized medicine promises to improve treatment outcomes through precise choice and dosage of drugs, resulting in shorter recovery times and improved quality of life.

"Non Nobis Solum Nati Sumus" (We are not born for ourselves alone.) - Cicero, 44 BCE