Centrifugal loop-mediated isothermal amplification microdevice for rapid, multiplex and colorimetric foodborne pathogen detection

We present a centrifugal microfluidic device which enables multiplex foodborne pathogen identification by loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) and colorimetric detection using Eriochrome Black T (EBT). Five identical structures were designed in the centrifugal microfluidic system to perform the genetic analysis of 25 pathogen samples in a high-throughput manner. The sequential loading and aliquoting of the LAMP cocktail, the primer mixtures, and the DNA sample solutions were accomplished by the optimized zigzag-shaped microchannels and RPM control. We targeted three kinds of pathogenic bacteria (Escherichia coli O157:H7, Salmonella typhimurium and Vibrio parahaemolyticus) and detected the amplicons of the LAMP reaction by the EBT-mediated colorimetric method. For the limit-of-detection (LOD) test, we carried out the LAMP reaction on a chip with serially diluted DNA templates of E. coli O157:H7, and could observe the color change with 380 copies. The used primer sets in the LAMP reaction were specific only to the genomic DNA of E. coli O157:H7, enabling the on-chip selective, sensitive, and high-throughput pathogen identification with the naked eyes. The entire process was completed in 60min. Since the proposed microsystem does not require any bulky and expensive instrumentation for end-point detection, our microdevice would be adequate for point-of-care (POC) testing with high simplicity and high speed, providing an advanced genetic analysis microsystem for foodborne pathogen detection.