Dina Eloseily

Project Proposal

Sepsis is an extremely serious condition that have can have severe side effects and even

lead to death in the worst cases. Because it is so severe, it is crucial to diagnose as early as

possible. As of now, testing blood can take up to a week, slowing the process of diagnosis. I am

working with a PhD student, Mustafa Al-Adhami, at the University of Maryland, Baltimore

County on a low-cost device to facilitate and expedite antibiotic susceptibility testing. With no

advanced training necessary, this device will be marketed to hospital labs in order for them to

test a patient’s blood and have results ready within a short period of time. More specifically, I

will be focusing on replacing the current microfluidic chips. These chips are created using

PMMA, also known as acrylic; however, my goal is to find a biodegradable alternative to this

design.
Timeline

January

Research and explore different biodegradable materials that could possibly replace PMMA to

manufacture a microfluidic cassette. Begin testing with plywood – how can we bond it with

PMMA to create a hydrophobic space for samples? Once this goal is completed, we will need to

ensure that the plywood chip does not absorb the sample.

February

Is there any material that can replace the excess PMMA in the chip to make it 100%

biodegradable? Research and experiment with alternate materials to see if this is possible.

March

Modify the cassette so that the device is able to read the fluorescence of the sample. The

plywood is not transparent, unlike the acrylic, so the device will not be able to read through it.

April

Once the cassette is done, we will run experiments to obtain data supporting the design.