Periodic Reporting for period 1 - AcouSome (Acoustofluidic thin-film actuated chip for exosome separation from blood)
Período documentado: 2023-01-01 hasta 2023-12-31
Exosomes are tiny vesicles budded of from all cells of the body and can be found in body fluids such as blood. They carry information from the cells they are budded of from and have been found to be useful for diagnostics of a wide range of diseases, including cancer infectious and cardiac diseases. Their clinical usefulness is therefore researched intensely. One big hurdle for this research and the diagnostics that is expected to come out of it is that it is challenging to find these virus-sized vesicles in body fluids such as blood. We therefore want to develop a module that can pick out and enrich them directly from blood, for use both in the research lab and in the resulting diagnostic instruments.
During the first year of the project we have investigated how well our technologies using ultrasound to move cells and vesicles in microscopic channels can be used to pick out exosomes from blood. The results are promising and we are now focusing on making them even better and possible to produce on a larger scale to reach all the research and diagnostic labs that would need them. We are for instance investigating new materials to make our devices.
We have for instance made our exosome capturing device capable of capturing many more exosomes by scaling it up, and already released it as an upgrade to our current exosome capturing instrument. We have also found a new method that is likely to increase the capacity even further, and are looking into if we can patent it. We also have promising results using new materials for the devices to make them easier to produce, less expensive and more environmentally friendly.