Development of lab on a chip for on-farm detection of sub-clinical ketosis

该项目将开发一种工具，使乳制品生产商能够以一种以前只能通过耗时的实验室分析完成的方式监测农场奶牛的健康状况。据估计，加拿大乳制品行业将从能够使用这项技术更有效地检测和管理奶牛疾病中获得重大利益。该工具将被开发为“芯片实验室”，这是一种小型设备，可用于对更大的实验室仪器进行现场实时分析。这项新技术将用于测量牛奶和奶牛血液样本中一种叫做BHBA的化学物质的含量。在任何外部症状出现之前，BHBA浓度的增加表明奶牛的健康受到了压力。这在奶牛产犊后的一段时间特别有用，因为这段时间奶牛很容易感染和生病。早期发现健康问题可以使生产者或兽医在动物死亡之前进行干预。

This project will develop a tool that allows dairy producers to monitor cows' health on the farm in a way that was previously only accomplished by time-consuming lab analyses. It is estimated that the Canadian dairy industry will derive significant benefits from being able to use this technology to more efficiently detect and manage cow disease. The tool will be developed as a "lab-on-a-chip," a small device that can be used to perform the analysis of much larger laboratory instruments on location and in real time. This novel technology will be applied to measure the levels of a chemical called BHBA in milk and blood samples from cows. Increased concentrations of BHBA indicate health stress in cows well before any external symptoms are observable. This can be particularly useful in the period after calving when cows are vulnerable to infection and illness. Early detection of health issues allows the producer or veterinarian to intervene before the animals'