MULTI-ANALYTE IMMUNOCHROMATOGRAPHIC TEST STRIP FOR BACTERIAL TOXIN DETECTION

描述（由申请人提供）：许多不同的致病微生物或病原体可以污染食品，因此存在许多不同的食源性感染。有害的毒素或化学物质也会污染食物，例如，有毒的蘑菇。微生物或毒素通过胃肠道进入人体，通常会引起最初的症状。恶心、呕吐、腹部痉挛和腹泻是许多食源性疾病的常见症状。许多微生物可以以不止一种方式传播，所以我们不能总是知道某种疾病是食源性的。这种区别很重要，因为公共卫生当局需要知道一种特定疾病是如何传播的，以便采取适当的措施来阻止它。例如，大肠杆菌O157:H7感染可以通过受污染的食物、受污染的饮用水、受污染的游泳水以及日托中心的幼儿之间的传播。根据导致病例传播的途径，阻止其他病例发生的措施可能包括从商店中移除受污染的食品、对游泳池进行氯消毒或关闭儿童日托中心。该项目的长期目标是开发一种简单易用、价格低廉、具有高灵敏度和选择性的横向流动试纸，用于多重检测引起食源性疾病的细菌毒素。使用特异性结合目标毒素的抗体将实现选择性和敏感性。抗体将与染料掺杂的二氧化硅纳米颗粒结合，这将提供细菌毒素污染的视觉指示。测试样本中毒素的阳性鉴定是基于试纸的工程和设计——每种毒素都会在试纸上的特定位置产生独特的颜色变化。该试纸条可用于公共、私营和政府部门内的众多不同公司和机构，用于监测食品和饮料质量，并扩展未来在医疗保健行业的诊断应用。第一阶段项目的具体目标是：目标1合成染料掺杂二氧化硅纳米颗粒，并用毒素特异性抗体进行修饰；目标2确定提供最佳试纸性能的材料和添加剂，并组装试纸；目标3评估试纸对接种缓冲样品和食品/饮料模拟物中三种不同毒素的反应；目标4整合第一阶段的研究结果，设计用于第二阶段开发的多分析物试纸。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Many different disease-causing microbes, or pathogens, can contaminate foods, so there are many different foodborne infections. Harmful toxins or chemicals can also contaminate food, for example, poisonous mushrooms. The microbes or toxins enter the body through the gastrointestinal tract, and often cause the first symptoms. Nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps and diarrhea are common symptoms in many foodborne diseases. Many microbes can spread in more than one way, so we cannot always know that a disease is foodborne. The distinction matters, because public health authorities need to know how a particular disease is spreading to take the appropriate steps to stop it. For example, Escherichia coli O157:H7 infections can spread through contaminated food, contaminated drinking water, contaminated swimming water, and from toddler to toddler at a day care center. Depending on which means of spread caused a case, the measures to stop other cases from occurring could range from removing contaminated food from stores, chlorinating a swimming pool, or closing a child day care center. The long-term goal of this project is to develop a simple-to-use and inexpensive lateral flow strip test with high sensitivity and selectivity for the multiplexed detection of bacterial toxins that cause foodborne illnesses. Selectivity and sensitivity will be achieved using antibodies that specifically bind to the target toxins. The antibodies will be bound to dye-doped silica nanoparticles, which will provide visual indication of bacterial toxin contamination. Positive identification of toxins in a test sample is based on the engineering and design of the test strip - each type of toxin will produce a unique color change at a specific location on the strip. The test strips can be used by a multitude of different companies and agencies within the public, private, and government sectors for monitoring food and beverage quality with extended future applications for diagnostics in the healthcare industry. The specific aims for the Phase I project are: Aim 1 Synthesize dye-doped silica nanoparticles and modify with toxin-specific antibodies, Aim 2 Identify materials and additives that will provide optimal test strip performance and assemble test strips, Aim 3 Evaluate the response of the test strips to target three different toxins in inoculated buffer samples and to food/beverage simulants, and Aim 4 Integrate Phase I findings to design the multi-analyte test strip to be developed in Phase II.