Objective This project is aimed at a better understanding, diagnosis and treatment orientation of allergy, a disease undergoing explosive and worrisome progress.The current methods for allergy diagnosis, based on incubation of patient and apos;s serum with a few all ergenic extracts, are quite insufficient for understanding and following the detailed molecular picture of the patient and apos;s allergy, in particular for complex food allergy cases. A more elaborate test should be used, in which any kind of food to be t ested for its potential allergenicity should be submitted to an analytical separation and screened for its content in allergens.The project proposes the development of a new miniature and automated multicriteria platform for separating allergens from food. The new Unit here proposed is a modern alternative to the conventional 2-D gel techniques. An and quot;Allergy Card and quot;, a simple chip able to separate complex protein analytes such as food extracts, will be developed. It will be based on two compl ementary electrophoresis principles, first by Capillary Iso-electric-Focusing (cIEF) into an ordered stack of proteins separated according of their respective charge or iso-electric points. Then these proteins will be further separated in a Carrier Ampholy te Based Capillary Electrophoresis (CABCE). A fully innovative immunodetection step will be applied at the end of the two successive electrophoretic separations.Thus besides strong innovation in the methodology of protein separation, the project proposes a radical enhancement in the power of allergen screening, with a considerable potential for research, diagnosis and treatment follow-up allergy. Fields of science medical and health sciencesclinical medicineallergologyfood allergynatural sciencesbiological sciencesbiochemistrybiomoleculesproteinsnatural scienceschemical scienceselectrochemistryelectrophoresis Keywords Capillary electrophoresis mass spectrometry proteomics Programme(s) FP6-MOBILITY - Human resources and Mobility in the specific programme for research, technological development and demonstration "Structuring the European Research Area" under the Sixth Framework Programme 2002-2006 Topic(s) MOBILITY-2.1 - Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowships (EIF) Call for proposal FP6-2004-MOBILITY-5 See other projects for this call Funding Scheme SCF - Marie Curie actions-Series of events Coordinator POLITECNICO DI MILANO EU contribution No data Address Piazza Leonardo da Vinci, 32 MILANO Italy See on map Links Website Opens in new window Total cost No data