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Principal Investigator:
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Mark S. Klempner, M.D.
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Organization:
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Boston University
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Project Ended:
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2005
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Bacteria, fungi and viruses can cause diseases in astronauts and ruin biomaterials important to the functioning of the spacecraft. Dr. Mark S. Klempner is developing a new system to detect and identify these microorganisms by using a new type of "fingerprinting" technique based on the surface characteristics of the microorganism. His team is also developing a novel biosensor to analyze the "surface fingerprints" of the different organisms.
|
Principal Investigator:
|
Mark S. Klempner, M.D.
|
|
Organization:
|
Boston University
|
|
Project Ended:
|
2005
|
The goal of this program is to develop a revolutionary, non-culture-based microbial detection, identification and quantification system that can be used as part of a Smart Medical System for exploratory space travel. Rapid detection and identification of microorganisms are critical to many military and civilian applications ranging from food and water safety monitoring, biological warfare-agent detection and to diagnostic microbiology of human and other biological specimens. For long-term exploratory space travel, there will be a critical need for a smart medical system to monitor the air and water supply for microbial contaminants as well as an intermittent need for assessment of biological specimens from symptomatic astronauts.
Current microbial identification systems are based on the gold standard of in vitro culture or DNA/RNA fingerprinting. Both require considerable sample manipulation, delay in readout, are semiquantitative and subject to interfering substances and contamination, and require additional processing to resolve complex mixtures of microorganisms.
This proposal involves the development of a novel smart medical system to detect and identify bacteria through the use of microsensors and includes three steps:
- Development of fingerprinting phage display libraries which can detect, identify, quantify and discriminate bacterial species in environmental and biological specimens;
- Application of phage-displayed peptides and antibody fragments in a microarray to the surface of a microsensor to demonstrate the microarray microbial-fingerprint response to selected bacterial species using optical readout and electronic MEMS resonator arrays, and to characterize the sensitivity and specificity for detecting and discriminating between bacterial species using surface fingerprints, and;
- Development of algorithms from the microarray response for the real-time identification and discrimination of bacterial species.
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