LxUS

Supervisor: Hugo Ferreira

*Navigating through the tempests of arthritis with the good hope of a better life - solution for a fast detection of Adalimumab*

 We are a multidisciplinary team raised from scratch by students from the University of Lisbon. By working with people from several scientific backgrounds, together with our professors, we want to put our abilities and skills to the test so we can have a positive impact on society.

Our biosensor has the purpose of allowing an easy, cheap and fast measurement of the plasma concentration of Adalimumab (ADL), an active component in drugs used to treat rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The biosensor is built upon three major components: the detection system, the gold nanoparticles solution, and the smartphone app. Its working principle is based on the spectrophotometry technique which allows transduction of changes in optical properties of the gold nanoparticles, functionalized with anti-ADL antibodies, as they bind to ADL. 

The detection system is comprised of a laser and a photodiode as a detector, allowing the transduction of the light transmitted through the cuvette with the particles into an electric signal. This signal is then amplified, processed and fed into an Arduino board with a Bluetooth module streaming of the results to the smartphone app, which displays and records them for future monitoring.

Our purpose is that our biosensor can be used to allow a more regular monitoring of ADL’s efficacy, by placing it in health centers located in remote areas whose population currently must travel to the big cities centers, resulting in a poor follow-up. Our end goal is to provide point-of-care biosensing solutions for monitoring of rheumatologic and autoimmune diseases treatment.