A scalable and modular lab-on-a-chip genetic analysis instrument

We demonstrate a new and extremely inexpensive, multipurpose desktop system for operating lab-on-a-chip (LOC) devices. The system provides all of the infrastructure necessary for genetic amplification and analysis, with orders of magnitude improvement in performance over our previous work. A modular design enables high levels of integration while allowing scalability to lower cost and smaller size. The component cost of this system is ca. $600, yet it could support many diagnostic applications. We demonstrate an implementation of genetic amplification via polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and analysis using capillary electrophoresis (CE). The PCR is able to amplify from single or several copies of target DNA and the CE performance (e.g. sensitivity) is comparable to that of commercial photomultiplier-based confocal lab-on-chip instrumentation. We believe this demonstrates that the cost of infrastructure need no longer be a barrier to the wide-spread application of LOC technologies in healthcare and beyond.