Recently, the Latvian Radio popular science program “Zināmais nezināmajā” (The Known in the Unknown) visited the Institute of Solid State Physics, University of Latvia (ISSP UL) to explore the innovations in biomedical technologies developed by our researchers. They spoke with team members of the GENEX and CLOTcheck projects, which are being developed within the BioPhoT platform.
Māra Šmite, researcher at the Micro and Nano Devices Laboratory, shared more about how CLOTcheck assesses blood coagulation status: “We have this standard small test tube in which medical staff take a blood sample. Then we place the CLOTcheck sterile cartridge into the blood, press a button, and the blood starts rising up the scale. After five minutes, we check how high the column has reached.” This makes it possible to very quickly evaluate how thick the patient's blood is and the associated risk of blood clots – the higher the column rises, the thinner the blood; the lower it stays, the thicker the blood is.
Gunita Kojāne, researcher at the Micro and Nano Devices Laboratory, introduced the innovative GENEX module for DNA extraction: “We are working to improve the method for preparing patient samples for testing, which is critically important for accurate results. Blood submitted for analysis contains many different components – fats, proteins – and the microstructured filters developed by GENEX help extract specifically DNA or RNA from the blood, allowing further identification of various diseases through their analysis.” Similar filters for DNA isolation are already in use, but they tend to vary from one another and have chaotic structures, which hinders obtaining consistent and accurate test results.
Full feature in Latvian on replay.lsm.lv (starts around 5:45)
