Issue 16, 2024

A novel immunoassay technique using principal component analysis for enhanced detection of emerging viral variants

Abstract

Rapid diagnostics are critical infectious disease tools that are designed to detect a known biomarker using antibodies specific to that biomarker. However, a way to detect unknown disease variants has not yet been achieved in a paper test format. We describe here a route to make an adaptable paper immunoassay that can detect an unknown biomarker, demonstrating it on SARS-CoV-2 variants. The immunoassay repurposes cross reactive antibodies raised against the alpha variant. Gold nanoparticles of two different colors conjugated to two different antibodies create a colorimetric signal, and machine learning of the resulting colorimetric pattern is used to train the assay to discriminate between variants of alpha and Omicron BA.5. By using principal component analysis, the colorimetric test patterns can pick up and discriminate an unknown variant that it has not encountered before, Omicron BA.1. The test has an accuracy of 100% and a potential calculated discriminatory power of 900. We show that it can be used adaptively and that it can be used to pick up emerging variants without the need to raise new antibodies.

Graphical abstract: A novel immunoassay technique using principal component analysis for enhanced detection of emerging viral variants

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
10 Jun 2024
Accepted
18 Jul 2024
First published
18 Jul 2024
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Lab Chip, 2024,24, 3985-3995

A novel immunoassay technique using principal component analysis for enhanced detection of emerging viral variants

J. Mata Calidonio, A. I. Maddox and K. Hamad-Schifferli, Lab Chip, 2024, 24, 3985 DOI: 10.1039/D4LC00505H

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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