Portable microfluidic system for determination of urinary creatinine

Area of Science:

• Analytical Chemistry
• Biomedical Engineering
• Clinical Diagnostics

Background:

• Urinary creatinine levels are crucial biomarkers for kidney function assessment.
• Conventional methods for creatinine determination can be time-consuming and require specialized laboratory equipment.
• There is a need for rapid, portable, and cost-effective diagnostic tools for point-of-care testing.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a simple, low-cost, and portable microfluidic system for the quantitative determination of urinary creatinine.
• To utilize a two-point alkaline picrate kinetic reaction for creatinine detection.
• To validate the performance of the developed microfluidic system against conventional methods.

Main Methods:

• A microfluidic system was designed using polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) microchips.
• Creatinine determination was performed using the alkaline picrate kinetic reaction, producing an orange-red color.
• Colorimetric detection was achieved using a portable miniature fiber optic spectrometer at 510 nm.

Main Results:

• The system demonstrated a linear detection range from 0 to 40 mg L(-1) creatinine (r2 = 0.997).
• A low detection limit of 3.3 mg L(-1) (S/N = 3) was achieved.
• The method showed good reproducibility with low intra-run (4.7-6.8%) and inter-run (7.9%) coefficients of variation, and high correlation (r2 = 0.948) with conventional spectrophotometry for real urine samples.

Conclusions:

• The developed portable microfluidic system provides a simple, cost-effective, and reliable method for urinary creatinine determination.
• The system's portability and ease of use make it suitable for point-of-care applications and decentralized clinical diagnostics.
• This technology has the potential to improve the accessibility and efficiency of kidney function monitoring.