Development of paper-based immunoassays to detect food chemical hazards

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Rapid, cost-effective, and accurate detection of food chemical hazards can offer an important means to improve food safety and economic benefit of biotechnology industry in Canada. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and immunochromatographic strip assay are two representative immunoassays that have been widely applied for the detection of food chemical hazards. However, conventional ELISA requires large volumes of analytes and reagents, and the time required for incubation and blocking steps are long. Further, the fabrication of immunochromatographic strip is complicated and the price of a single test is high. In this NSERC CRD project, we propose to develop low-cost paper-based immunoassays to improve the detection of food chemical hazards. As two representative techniques to pattern paper, photolithography and wax screen printing will be applied to fabricate microzone on paper for the development of both competitive and sandwich ELISA assays to detect selective veterinary drug residues and allergens, respectively. In addition, inkjet printing technique will be applied to fabricate microfluidic paper-based immunochromatographic strips for the detection of the aforementioned food chemical hazards in a "one-step" procedure. The developed paper-based immunoassays for the detection of food chemical hazards offer a few major advantages over the conventional immunoassays. They are more rapid, high-throughput, and only require small amount of samples, reagents, and simple equipment. The availability of this technology will provide Canadian manufactures with unprecedented insight and advantages in the development of the next-generation immunoassays. Continuous information certifying the performance quality of advanced immunoassays will secure the premier position of Canadian agri-food diagnostic products in the world marketplace. Moreover, the knowledge developed in the areas of patterned paper along with microfluidic "lab-on-a-chip" technique represent an advance of fundamental importance to the field of analytical chemistry that applied in agricultural, food, and biotechnology industry.