Development of a bedside diagnostic tool to determine low levels of free haemoglobin in whole blood

血红蛋白(Hb)主要分布在红细胞的细胞室内。然而，创伤、手术和某些疾病状态(如镰状细胞、地中海贫血和疟疾)会导致红细胞破裂/溶血，从而将游离的Hb释放到循环中。内源性保护是由Hb结合和去除蛋白结合珠蛋白(Ha)提供的，但这一储备迅速被淹没。游离Hb最近被认为与肾功能衰竭、感染、败血症、急性呼吸窘迫综合征(ARDS)、高血压和肺动脉高压有关。因此，有必要开发一种灵敏、快速、床边游离的Hb定量方法，以帮助为患者的诊断和临床管理提供信息。在这个项目中，我们将探索两种潜在的解决方案，一种是基于电化学检测的，另一种是基于分光光度的。

Haemoglobin (Hb) is predominantly localised within the cellular compartment of red blood cells. However, traumatic injuries, surgery and some disease states (e.g. sickle cell, thalassemia and malaria) cause red cell rupture/haemolysis which releases free Hb into the circulation. Endogenous protection is afforded by the Hb binding and removal protein haptoglobin (Ha), but this reserve is rapidly overwhelmed. Free Hb has recently been implicated in kidney failures, infection, sepsis, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), hypertension and pulmonary arterial hypertension. Thus there is an emerging need to develop a sensitive and rapid, bedside, free Hb quantitation method to help inform diagnosis and clinical management of patients. In this project, we will explore two potential solutions to this challenge one based on electrochemical detection and the other spectrophotometry.