Latest research contribution of Prof. Mohamad Sawan's team on biosensing technology of chronic diseases detection

The early diagnosis of chronic diseases is a significant global health concern. This type of disease not only affects the quality of life and well-being of patients but also imposes a heavy burden of long-term care and high medical costs. To accurately diagnose such diseases, scientists have been searching for sensitive instruments capable of monitoring multiple biomarkers. Previously, we introduced early detection technologies related to Alzheimer and the high potential of novel biosensors for early diagnosis of Alzheimer.

BioMEMS sensors are recognized as highly sensitive structures in biosensing applications. These electromechanical platforms can detect biological species by measuring the dynamic or static deflection of their transducers. Surface stress-based biosensors operating in the static mode can be promising candidates to precisely quantify target analytes using optical detection mechanisms.

Our recent study published in Biosensors journal is titled "Grating Bio-Microelectromechanical Platform Architecture for Multiple Biomarker Detection". The design of a novel MEMS biosensing platform based on a tunable one-dimensional grating metamaterial is proposed here. In the present structure, a highly sensitive cantilever used as a BioMEMS transducer causes structural changes in the proposed metamaterial design, which leads to strong changes in the wavelength spectrum of this periodic optical pattern. Also, given the importance of multi-biomarker identification in the diagnosis of chronic diseases, including neurological disorders, an array design of the proposed biosensor for multiplexed biomarker analysis without increasing the complexity of the optical detection system is presented. Therefore, the proposed platform can be a valuable device in the diagnosis of chronic diseases as well as drug monitoring applications.

Congratulations to our postdoctoral fellow Fahimeh Marvi and to co-authors (Kian Jafari and Mohamad Sawan) for this achievement.

Reference

Marvi F, Jafari K, Sawan M. Grating Bio-Microelectromechanical Platform Architecture for Multiple Biomarker Detection. Biosensors (Basel). 2024 Aug 9;14(8):385.

More information can be found at the following link:

https://www.mdpi.com/2079-6374/14/8/385

Research Highlights

1) Highly sensitive and precise detection of biomarkers for disease diagnosis.

2) Multiplexed biomarker analysis without increasing the complexity of the optical detection system using an array of the proposed biosensor.

Abstract

A label-free biosensor based on a tunable MEMS metamaterial structure is proposed in this paper. The adopted structure is a one-dimensional array of metamaterial gratings with movable and fixed fingers. The moving unit of the optical detection system is a component of the MEMS structure, driven by the surface stress effect. Thus, these suspended optical nanoribbons can be moved and change the grating pattern by the biological bonds that happened on the modified cantilever surface. Such structural variations lead to significant changes in the optical response of the metamaterial system under illuminating angled light and subsequently shift its resonance wavelength spectrum. As a result, the proposed biosensor shows appropriate analytical characteristics, including the mechanical sensitivity of S_m= 11.55 μm/Nm⁻¹, the optical sensitivity of S_o= Δλ/Δd = 0.7 translated to S_o= Δλ/Δσ = 8.08 μm/Nm⁻¹, and the quality factor of Q = 102.7. Also, considering the importance of multi-biomarker detection, a specific design of the proposed topology has been introduced as an array for identifying different biomolecules. Based on the conducted modeling and analyses, the presented device poses the capability of detecting multiple biomarkers of disease at very low concentrations with proper precision in fluidic environments, offering a suitable bio-platform for lab-on-chip structures.

Fig.1. 3D schematic of the proposed optical BioMEMS platform for biosensing of target analytes.

图1: 用于目标分析物生物传感的拟议光学BioMEMS平台的三维示意图。

Fig.2.Tuning the optical pattern by any mechanical deflections of the BioMEMS transducer and induced wavelength changes.

图2: 通过 BioMEMS 传感器的任何机械偏转和诱导波长变化来调整光学图案。