The aim of the research project is to develop a very inexpensive and rapid capacitance measurement technique that can be used as a diagnostic test to identify specific infectious organisms, their resistance to antimicrobial drugs, and their pathogenicity in a clinical setting. The goal is to make the cost so low that managed health organizations would encourage its use to identify pathogens and their resistance to antibiotics, thus greatly reducing the prescription of antibiotics in cases where they are ineffective, and consequently reducing one source of development of antimicrobial resistant strains of bacteria. The proposed diagnostic is based upon capacitance detection of DNA hybridization to probes on an array. In Phase I, we have demonstrated the technique works using both oligonucleotide and peptide nucleic acid (PNA) probes on coated gold insulators. We have also systematically explored the probe attachment and hybridization chemistry and their relationship to the stability of capacitance measurements on the array. In Phase II, we will continue to improve the chemistry and measurement hardware. We will also develop prototype arrays to detect some of the common pathogens encountered in a clinical setting.
