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Updated: May 13, 2026
Dry Film Photoresist-based Electrochemical Microfluidic Biosensor Platform: Device Fabrication, On-chip Assay Preparation, and System Operation
Published on: September 19, 2017
Electrophoretic microfluidic devices for mutation detection in clinical diagnostics
Alison H Dewald1, Brian L Poe, James P Landers
1University of Virginia, Department of Chemistry, McCormick Road, Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA +1 434 243 8658 ; +1 434 924 3048 ; landers@virginia.edu.
Background:
In an era of growing interest in personalized medicine - where ubiquitous patient genotyping holds unprecedented clinical utility - rapid, sensitive and low-cost methodologies will be required for the detection of genetic variants correlative with disease. Electrophoretic microfluidic devices have emerged as a promising platform for such analyses, inherently offering faster analysis, excellent reagent economy, a small laboratory footprint and potentially seamless integration of multiple analytical steps.
Objective:
Although glass and polymeric microchips have recently been developed for a wide variety of medical applications, this review focuses on their application to the detection of clinically relevant genomic DNA mutations and polymorphisms.
Method:
Mutation analysis techniques, including direct gene sizing, enzyme-based assays, heteroduplex analysis, single-strand conformational polymorphism analysis, and multiplex, allele-specific and methylation-specific PCR are included.
Conclusion:
Further development of 'lab-on-a-chip' or 'micro total analysis system' technologies ultimately aims to streamline and miniaturize the entire genetic analysis process, enabling rapid, point-of-care analysis for molecular diagnostics.
