Up-Conversion Luminescence System for Quantitative Detection of IL-6

Interleukin-6 (IL-6) is a very important cytokine and an early predictor of survival in febrile patients (eg, patients with COVID-19). With the outbreak of the COVID-19 in the world, the significance of medical detection of interleukin 6 has gradually become prominent. A method to point-of-care(POCT) diagnosis and monitoring of IL-6 levels in patients is urgently needed. In this work, an up-conversion luminescence system (ULS) based on upconverting nanoparticles (UCNs) for quantitative detection of IL-6 was designed. The ULS consists of Micro Controller Units (MCU), transmission device, laser, image acquisition module, Bluetooth module, etc. Through hardware system acquisition and image software algorithm processing, we obtain a limit of detection (LOD) of IL-6 at 1 ng/mL, and the quantitative range is from 1 to 200 ng/mL. The system is handheld and has great detection accuracy. The detection time is 10 minutes. In addition, the system can access mobile device terminals (smartphones, personal computers, etc.) or 5G cloud servers via Bluetooth and WIFI. Patients and family members can view medical data through mobile terminals, and the data stored in the 5G cloud server can be used for edge computing and big data analysis. It is suitable for the early diagnosis of infectious diseases such as COVID-19 and has good application prospects.