Microarrays Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Microarrays, including details on experiments, designs, statistics, analysis, software.

Neuron-based microarray sensors for environmental sensing.

Prasad S, Zhang X, Ozkan CS, Ozkan M

Department of Electrical Engineering, University of California, Riverside 92521, USA.

We present a novel sensing scheme for detecting the effects of unburned fossil fuels by integrating microarray technology and dielectrophoresis to develop single-neuron arrays. These arrays have the capability to sense and identify the two fuels, at parts per billion (ppb) concentrations, as well to determine the associated physiological changes at the single-cell level. Identification is achieved through frequency domain analysis of the measured changes to the extracellular electrical activity due to the effect of the fossil fuels. This yields unique electrical identifiers known as "signature patterns". Simultaneous optical visualization to the physiological changes is obtained by specific fluorescent staining. The correlation between the signature patterns and the cellular biological behavior establishes the veracity of this identification technique.

Published 3 December 2004 in Electrophoresis, 25(21): 3746-60.
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