Phase I - A multiplexed next generation platform for cannabinoid detection

大麻产品被广泛用作治疗和娱乐药物。测量损伤的主要目标是一种叫做四氢大麻酚的大麻分子。四氢大麻酚是医学、体育和执法环境中药物筛选的常见目标。由于四氢大麻酚会损害运动功能，因此严禁在操作机动车辆或重型机械前使用大麻。目前，已有检测四氢大麻酚的技术，但存在成本高、基础设施庞大、从样本到答案的时间长、用户界面不友好等问题。此外，目前所有的技术都只能检测四氢大麻酚，仅凭这一点并不能提供准确的损伤评估。Shih博士和他的实验室最近开发了一项名为“EMMA-Sense”（电化学多平台微流体适体传感器）的技术，使最终用户能够使用具有非常高灵敏度的四氢大麻酚电化学检测。终端用户可以将他们的唾液提供到一个管中，将他们的唾液注射到设备中（通过管），并在一分钟内使用他们的手机检测四氢大麻酚。我们在真实的唾液样本中加入了四氢大麻酚，取得了很大的成功，然而，这些设备的制造还不能大规模生产，而且它不能检测其他类型的大麻分子。为了使其成为一种商业产品，我们需要为我们的设备设计一种可大规模生产的方法，并检测多种大麻分子，而不仅仅是四氢大麻酚。因此，我们计划通过设计和发现传感不同大麻分子的新方法（在Jonathan Perrault博士的帮助下，INRS），设计可以大规模生产方法的设备（在海星医疗的帮助下），以及用加入不同大麻分子的唾液来评估新设备来实现这些目标。我们还将有我们的工业合作伙伴stream Biotechnologies来评估这项技术，并就我们如何提高这项技术的可用性提供反馈。这些关键步骤将增加我们技术的价值，并为我们的受体公司stream Biotechnology做好准备，后者可能会授权和销售该系统。

Cannabis products are widely used as therapeutic and recreational drugs. The main target to measure impairment is a cannabis molecule called THC. THC is a common target for drug screening in the medical, athletic and law enforcement contexts. Since THC impairs motor functions, cannabis use is strictly prohibited before operating a motor vehicle or heavy machinery. Currently, there are technologies to detect THC but it suffers from high costs, bulky infrastructure, lengthy sample-to-answer results, and not user-friendly. Furthermore, all the current technologies only detect THC, and this alone does not provide an accurate assessment of impairment. A recent technology, called "EMMA-Sense" (Electrochemical Multiplatform Microfluidics Aptamer based Sensor) has been developed by Dr. Shih and his lab to enable end-users to use electrochemical detection of THC with very high sensitivity. End users can provide their saliva into a tube, inject their saliva into the device (via tube), and detect THC in one minute using their cellphone. We showed much success with real saliva samples spiked with THC, however, the fabrication of these devices are not mass manufacturable and it cannot detect other types of cannabis molecules. For this to become a commercial product, we are required to devise a mass manufacturable method for our devices and to detect multiple cannabis molecules, not just THC. Therefore, we plan to achieve these goals by designing and discovering new methods for sensing different cannabis molecules (with the help of Dr. Jonathan Perrault, INRS), design devices that can be scaled-up to mass production methods (with the help from StarFish Medical), and evaluate the new devices with saliva spiked with the different cannabis molecules. We will also have our industrial partner, Strem Biotechnologies, to evaluate the technology and to provide feedback on how we can improve the usability of the technology. These are critical steps that will increase the value of our technology and make it ready for our receptor company, Strem Biotechnology, who will potentially license and market the system.