Sensitive, Semiquantitative, and Portable Nucleic Acid Detection of Rabies Virus Using a Personal Glucose Meter

Rabies is a zoonotic infection with the potential to infect all mammals and poses a significant threat to mortality. Although enzyme-linked immunosorbent tests and real-time reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) have been established for rabies virus (RABV) detection, they require skilled staff. Here, we introduce a personal glucose meter (PGM)-based nucleic acid (NA-PGM) detection method to diagnose RABV. This method ensures sensitive and convenient RABV diagnosis through hybridization of reverse transcription-recombinase aided amplification (RT-RAA) amplicons with probes labeled with sucrose-converting enzymes, reaching a detection level as low as 6.3 copies/μL equivalent to 12.26 copies. NA-PGM allows for the differentiation of RABV from other closely related viruses. In addition, NA-PGM showed excellent performance on 65 clinical samples with a 100% accuracy rate compared with the widely adopted RT-qPCR method. Thus, our developed NA-PGM method stands out as sensitive, semiquantitative, and portable for RABV detection, showcasing promise as a versatile platform for a wide range of pathogens.