DropCRISPR: A LAMP-Cas12a based digital method for ultrasensitive detection of nucleic acid

Since their discovery, CRISPR/Cas systems have been extensively exploited in nucleic acid biosensing. However, the vast majority of contemporary platforms offer only qualitative detection of nucleic acid, and fail to realize ultrasensitive quantitative detection. Herein, we report a digital droplet-based platform (DropCRISPR), which combines loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) with CRISPR/Cas12a to realize ultrasensitive and quantitative detection of nucleic acids. This is achieved through a novel two-step microfluidic system which combines droplet LAMP with a picoinjector capable of injecting the required CRISPR/Cas12a reagents into each droplet. This method circumvents the temperature incompatibilities of LAMP and CRISPR/Cas12a and avoids mutual interference between amplification reaction and CRISPR detection. Ultrasensitive detection (at fM level) was achieved for a model plasmid containing the invA gene of Salmonella typhimurium (St), with detection down to 10² cfu/mL being achieved in pure bacterial culture. Additionally, we demonstrate that the DropCRISPR platform is capable of detecting St in raw milk samples without additional nucleic acid extraction. The sensitivity and robustness of the DropCRISPR further demonstrates the potential of CRISPR/Cas-based diagnostic platforms, particularly when combined with state-of-the-art microfluidic architectures.