Dental caries is the single most common affliction across the globe, affecting 2.4 billion people. The current process of identifying dental caries involves examining caries formation by naked eyes or X-ray during routine checkups. Once identified, surgical-restorative procedures are used to drill out the decay portion of the tooth an filled with synthetic material. This style of 'drill & fill' dental care is highly ineffective and osts more than $43 billion in the United State per year. The American Dental Association promotes the "early detection and preventive treatment" paradigm, which could dramatically reduce human suffering and the high cost associated with the disease. Traditional broad spectrum compounds such as chlorhexidine and Xylitol are effective, however even more promising are species-specific antibiotics which leave the 'healthy' commensal bacteria intact. For these preventive treatments to be useful, it is crucial that caries formation is predicted before structual damage is done to the tooth. We propose to achieve that by detecting Streptocauccus mutans (S. mutans), a major cariogenic bacteria which its salivary concentration strongly correlates to future caries formation. Currently, the only methods capable of detecting S. mutans at relevant concentrations are all lab based, such as PCR or ELISA, which are very rarely used due to the high cost and long time-to-result. The main goal of this project is to develop the next generation rapid, inexpensive and simple test for the detection of S. mutans using the novel 3-dimensional Paper Sensor (3PS) technology. The 3PS device incorporate a sample pre-concentration step using aqueous two-phase system (ATPS) and a rapid lateral-flow immunoassay (LFA) for detection. Traditional LFA is not sensitive enough to detect S. mutans at relevant concentrations. To overcome this barrier, a concentration component using ATPS can concentrate the target pathogen by several orders of magnitude prior to LFA detection. By using paper microfludics, we demonstrated our 3PS device can simultaneously and seamless concentrate and detect target pathogen using only light and inexpensive paper materials. Once fully developed, the 3PS device will be a rapid (
Public Health Relevance Statement: Public Health Relevance: The objective of this project is to translate our breakthrough paper-based diagnostic technology into a rapid, inexpensive, and reliable chairside test for early prediction of dental caries, which is one of the most prevalent and costly oral diseases in the United States. This vital but currently missing component in oral healthcare, combined with preventive treatments, could dramatically reduce dental caries and the high costs associated with the disease. Besides being low cost, the proposed device does not require power, equipment or trained personnel, which is particularly suitable to use in resource-poor settings.
NIH Spending Category: Bioengineering; Dental/Oral and Craniofacial Disease; Infectious Diseases; Prevention
Project Terms: 3-Dimensional; Affect; American Dental Association; Antibiotics; Antibodies; antigen antibody binding; aqueous; Bacteria; base; Binding (Molecular Function); Biological Markers; Blood capillaries; capillary; cariogenic bacteria; checkup examination; Chemistry; Chlorhexidine; commensal microbes; cost; cost effectiveness; Dehydration; Dental; Dental Care; Dental caries; Dentists; design; Detection; Development; Devices; Diagnostic; Diagnostic tests; Disease; Distal; Early Diagnosis; Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; Equipment; Eye; Future; Goals; Health Personnel; Health Professional; Healthcare; high reward; high risk; Home environment; Human; Human Resources; Image; Immunoassay; improved; innovation; Intervention; Label; Laboratories; Lateral; Left; Light; Liquid substance; Methods; Mouth Diseases; next generation; novel; One-Step dentin bonding system; Operative Surgical Procedures; Oral; Organic solvent product; Paper; pathogen; Performance; Phase; Positioning Attribute; Pregnancy Tests; Preventive; Procedures; Process; Proteins; prototype; public health relevance; Quality of Care; Rehydrations; Reporter; Resources; Roentgen Rays; Running; Salivary; Sampling; Scheme; Sensitivity and Specificity; sensor; Site; small molecule; Solutions; Sorting - Cell Movement; Specimen; Speed (motion); Staging; Streptococcus mutans; System; Technology; Testing; Thermodynamics; Time; tooth filling; Tooth structure; Training; Translating; United States; Virus; Xylito
