Microarray System for Phenotypic and Functional Cytometry

描述（由申请人提供）：申请的长期目标是开发一种自主临床诊断系统，用于监测感染、炎症、哮喘、自身免疫性疾病和肿瘤中发生的正常和病变免疫功能。该系统将是一个基于微阵列的生物检测平台，专门从患者血液样本中捕获不同的细胞类型和可溶性大分子，并将其捕获到生物传感器芯片上的空间分离区域上。可以对大分子和细胞的初始捕获进行量化，以评估白细胞、细胞因子、抗体和其他免疫学相关分子的特定亚群的存在。捕获的细胞在不同条件下的后续培养可用于实时测量特定细胞产物的产生，以评估免疫细胞的功能能力。该技术允许高度平行测量，从而能够同时执行数百个单个功能细胞分析，而无需使用分子标记。该系统将能够使用微升规模的血液样本，通过微创手术（例如，手指穿刺毛细血管血液采样），近乎实时地评估患者的免疫能力。这种实时测量对于持续监测疾病进展以及评估维持和支持免疫机制的预防性治疗和治疗操作至关重要。该项目将开发能够改进自身免疫性疾病和传染病诊断的工具。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The long-term objective of the proposed effort is to develop an autonomous clinical diagnostics system for monitoring normal and diseased immune function that occurs in the context of infection, inflammation, asthma, autoimmune disease, and neoplasia. This system will be a microarray-based bioassay platform that specifically captures distinct cell types and soluble macromolecules from a patient's blood sample onto spatially separate regions on a biosensor chip. Initial capture of macromolecules and cells can be quantified to assess the presence of specific subpopulations of leukocytes, cytokines, antibodies and other immunologically relevant molecules. Subsequent culture of the captured cells under different conditions can be used to measure the production of specific cell products in real time to assess immune cell functional capacities. The technology allows for highly parallel measurements that result in the capability to perform hundreds of individual functional cellular assays simultaneously without the use of molecular labels. The system will enable assessment of patients' immune capacity in near-real time using microliter-scaled samples of blood readily harvested with minimally invasive procedures (e.g., fingerstick capillary blood sampling). Such real-time measurements will be crucial for the ongoing monitoring of disease progression as well as the evaluation of prophylactic treatments and therapeutic manipulations that sustain and support immune mechanisms. This project will develop tools that will enable improved diagnostics for autoimmune diseases and for infectious diseases.