Sensors & Actuators: B.

Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/snb

Development of a portable and sensitive blood serum test system using LED- T
based absorption photometry and pump-free microfluidic technology
⁎
Rongke Gaoa, , Yuanmeng Wua, Jing Huangb, Le Songa, Haiyang Qiana, Xuefei Songa, Lei Chenga,
⁎
Rui Wangc, Lin-bao Luod, Gang Zhaoe, Liandong Yua,
a
School of Instrument Science and Opto-electronic Engineering, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei 230009, China
b
Hefei University of Technology Hospital, Hefei 230009, China
c
Institute of Functional Materials and Molecular Imaging, College of Emergency and Trauma, Hainan Medical University, Haikou 571199, China
d
School of Electronic Sciences and Applied Physics, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei 230009, China
e
Department of Electronic Science and Technology, University of Science avd Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: We reported a novel integrated portable human blood system based on absorption photometry and microfluidic
Microfluidic chip technology. A capillary pump for fluid control was embedded in microfluidic chip instead of heavy syringe
Absorption photometry pump. The analytes could automatically flow, mix and react in chip. It achieves long-term stability of hydro-
Blood serum test philic microfluidic channel surface for rapid and sensitive detection. Herein, we detected three analytes from
Hydrophilic surface treatment
human blood, including triglyceride (TGL), albumin (ALB) and total protein (TP) which are very important for
Pump-free
Microfluidics
health examination. All components of this system including light-emitting diode (LED) light source, micro-
POCT fluidic chip, photodiode detector (PD), electronic circuit, Organic LED screen and memory card were fully in-
tegrated into a portable instrument with small size (11.2 × 7.2 × 6.1 cm). The pair of LED and PD was used for
measuring light absorbance of biochemical assay. The limit of detections (LODs) for TGL, ALB and TP were
estimated to be below 0.1 mmol/L, 4 g/L and 10 g/L respectively, which is significantly below the clinical cut-off
value. Passing − Boblok regression analyses were used to achieve the evaluation for this system. It showed good
accuracy and feasibility of our system and was expected to be useful as a potential clinical tool for human blood
serum test.

1. Introduction
Absorption photometry is a well-demonstrated and wildly used
analytical technique in global world, especially in biochemistry and
analytical chemistry, because of its simplicity, flexibility, low cost and
convenience. However, most of the conventional absorption spectro-
meters usually require milliliters sample, rather than microliters or
nanoliters sample. Furthermore, they required the professional expert,
fine laboratory and cost burden of maintenance [1,2]. Hence, the im-
portance of developing portable, sensitive, rapid and miniaturized ab-
sorption spectrometers could not be more emphasized nowadays as the
demand for disease diagnosis and better healthcare is constantly in-
creasing.
In the past few decades, point of care test (POCT) devices were
proposed and integrated with various detection technologies, which can
be applied for health diagnostics and disease control [3–5]. POCT de-
vices take the advantage of portability, low cost, instrument-
independent and simple operation compared with the traditional ap-
paratus. A lot of new detection platforms and categories of POCT de-
vices have been reported, such as microfluidic paper-based analytical
devices (μPADs), smartphone-based biosensing devices, microfluidic
chip-based diagnostic devices, Lab-On-A-Drone system and so on. These
new POCT techniques significantly contributed the field-detection for
medical and military application. Li et al. demonstrated an original
method to manipulate capillary-driven fluids by fabricating a movable
valve on paper-based microfluidic device, which is user-friendly to
carry out complex multistep operations [6]. Jung et al. reported an
innovative microfluidic chip-based POCT device, which can employ in a
sensitive immunoassay for the detection of thyroid stimulating hor-
mone. [7]. Erickson et al. integrated smartphone with thermal PCR to
achieve fluorescence detection of Kaposi’s Sarcoma herpesvirus. They
provided a clear example to show smartphone as a powerful tool in
POCT devices [8]. With the popularization of drones, it became possible
to perform biochemical analysis on drone system and send POCT

⁎
Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: rkgao@hfut.edu.cn (R. Gao), liandongyu@hfut.edu.cn (L. Yu).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.snb.2019.01.065
Received 23 October 2018; Received in revised form 22 December 2018; Accepted 13 January 2019
Available online 18 January 2019
0925-4005/ © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
R. Gao et al.
devices in some urgent accidents [9]. Nevertheless, POCT based min-
iaturized detection systems performed in the human blood serum test,
such as glucose, lactate and cancer biomarkers testing, suffered from
loss of detection sensitivity compared to traditional clinical detection
systems [10,11].
Recently, the miniaturization of absorption photometry (AP) device
for POCT application has been one of the important trends. Light source
as one of key components tightly correlated with experiment results.
Light-emitting diode (LED), a solid state semiconductor diode, is fre-
quently used in absorption detection systems since its numerous ad-
vantages including wide wavelength scale from infrared to ultraviolet,
stable intensity, long lifetime, low cost, low noise, to be pulsed at fast
rates and small size [12]. This AP-based POCT device has successfully
applied in conventional biomedical detection [13,14]. Nonetheless,
these detection systems still require tedious manual sampling and
loading steps. In addition, paper-based device suffered from the low
mixing efficiency, poor sensitivity and chemical additives.
To solve these problems, we reported a novel portable AP-based
microfluidic system that was composed of pump-free microfluidic chip
for rapid mixing, reacting and detection without professional training
and expensive instrument. Microfluidic chip can realize high mixing
efficiency, sensitive detection and miniaturization of POCT device
[15,16]. Meanwhile, pump-free function allows liquids transportation
without using external pumps and valves for improving portability and
automation [17–19]. The liquids could be moved by using capillary
forces due to the geometry and surface chemistry of microfluidic
channels. The proposed miniaturization detection system in this study
was composed of four units: pre-mixing chamber, winding-shaped
channel, comb-like channel and storage chamber, corresponding to
sample loading, mixing, capillary pump and AP detection, respectively.
The output voltages of various concentrations of human blood serum
were measured for trace analysis of triglyceride (TGL), albumin (ALB)
and total protein (TP). ALB and TP are mostly detected in human blood
serum test because they tightly correlated with the diseases of liver,
kidney, or bone marrow as well as metabolic disorders [20–22]. TGL
level in serum is recognized as a valuable indicator of atherosclerosis,
hypertension and liver disease and is a risk factor for coronary artery
disease, nephritis, and other diseases relating on lipid metabolism.
The novelty of our work is threefold. First, we successfully im-
plemented rapid and accurate detection of clinical samples with this
home-built AP-based microfluidic system. Second, the combination of
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Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93
Fig. 1. (A) The applications of portable ab-
sorption photometry (AP)-based microfluidic
system. (B) A schematic illustration of portable
absorption photometry (AP)-based microfluidic
system, which includes the circuit control
system [(i) Microcontroller (ii) USB interface
(iii) Keys (iv) OLED screen (v) LED (vi)
Photodiode detector (vii) Printed circuit
board], optical part [(viii) Optical baffle (ix)
Optical lens], microfluidic sensor [(x)
Microfluidic chip (xi) the channel for placing
microfluidic chip], (xii) package board. (C) The
photograph of entire detection system.
pump-free microfluidic chip and absorption photometry detection can
realize portability, low-cost, small sample consumption and easy-to-use
owing to eliminate the external syringe pump. Third, we fabricated a
rapid capillary-driven microfluidic channel because the comb-like
structure and hydrophilic surface treatment can accelerate flow rate
together. It cost less time than conventional pump-free microfluidic
chip to fill out the chip. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first
portable absorption photometry detection system that applied pump-
free microfluidic chip as detection platform. This system successfully
determined the level of TGL, ALB and TP for the clinical analysis of
human blood serum automatically.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Materials and reagents
Standard calibrator solutions of Triglyceride (TGL), Albumin (ALB)
and Total Protein (TP) and corresponding assay reagents were obtained
from Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics (Newark, USA). The human
serums including TGL, ALB and TP were provided by Hefei University
of Technology Hospital. Polyethylene glycol (PEG, MW 200), methyl
blue (MW 799.80), new coccine (85%) and isopropanol (> 99.9%)
were purchased from Aladdin industrial corporation (Shanghai, China).
Acetone was from Haomiao chemical raw material corporation
(Jiangsu, China). Ethyl alcohol (95%) was from Damao chemical re-
agent factory (Tianjin, China). Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS, Sylgard
184 Silicone. Elastomer Kit) was purchased from Dow Corning.
Deionized water was purified using a Milli-Q water purification system
(Billerica, MA, USA).
2.2. Design of portable absorption photometry based pump-free microfluidic
system
As shown in Fig. 1B, the detection system with a size of
11.2cm × 7.2cm × 6.1cm is fabricated by the commercial AutoCAD
software (2014) (Autodesk Corporation, USA) and 3D printing (Ma-
kerbot Replicator2X, MakerBot Corporation, Brooklyn, USA). The por-
table absorption photometry based pump-free microfluidic system is
consisted of electronic circuit control module (as shown in Fig. S1),
optical detection module, communication module, and pump-free mi-
crofluidic chip. All of the components are fully integrated in a small
R. Gao et al.
Fig. 2. The schematic of biosensing mechanism for TGL, ALB and TP.
box. The optical detection module is composed of light-emitting diode
(LED), lens, and photodiodes. The electronic circuit module is in-
tegrated into a printed circuit board (PCB) (Fig. 1B (vii)) designed by
Altium Designer 16 (AD16) software (Altium Corporation, Australia). A
capillary force driven microfluidic channel was designed and fabricated
on PDMS chip as detection platform. Additionally, USB interface is used
to download instructions and transmit data between microcontroller
and computer. The total cost of this system is about 50 US dollars.
Fig. 1C shows the experimental setup before test.
In this work, a processing program was developed to achieve the
calibration of absorption photometry and sample measurements. The
absorbance of sample was acquired from Eq. 1.
A = -log10(I/I0) = εlCA (1)
Herein, A is the absorbance of sample, (I/I0) is the ratio of the in-
tensity of transmission light to incident light, ε is the molar absorptivity
characteristic of a substance (m2/mol), l is the path length of the light
(m), and CA is the concentration of the sample (mol/m3) [23]. Im-
portantly, the molar absorptivity characteristics are sensitive to light
sources. The absorption spectrum peaks of each assay reagents are
different. To get the maximum absorbance, three light sources (510 nm,
540 nm and 600 nm) would be used in system. As a result, a special
structure was designed to have the capability to change light sources, as
shown in Fig. 1B (viii).
2.3. Fabrication and surface treatment of pump-free microfluidic chip
PDMS microfluidic channel was fabricated using soft lithography
and rapid prototyping technology. A negative SU-8 photoresist
(Microchem Corp, Westborough, US) mold was fabricated on a silicon
wafer through a transparent mask. Then, PDMS prepolymer and curing
reagent were mixed in a ratio of 10:1 w/w and degassed before poured
over the mold. After curing the structure at 70℃ for 2.5 h on hot plate,
the structured PDMS layer was peeled off from the mold and punched
inlet and outlet holes (D = 5 mm) in order to access solutions.
Hydrophilic surface treatment was performed by coating PEG polymer
on the PDMS layer [24]. Briefly, PDMS layer and glass were respec-
tively cleaned using an ultrasonic wash in isopropanol and acetone for
5 min, rinsed by DI water, and dried on heating plate. PDMS layer was
exposed to an oxygen plasma for 90 s and immediately modified by the
PEG, then moved to the hot plate at 150 ℃ for 25 min. Following
heating, the PDMS layer was washed by isopropanol and DI water re-
spectively at room temperature to remove the residual PEG, and dried
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Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93
on the hot plate at 70 ℃. After treatment in an oxygen plasma, the
structured PDMS layer was aligned onto a glass slide to form an irre-
versible bond. The main channel and side channels were 400 μm and
200 μm wide respectively. To ensure that loading effects did not distort
the results, new chips were used for each measurement.
2.4. Biosensing mechanism
The TGL, ALB and TP can react with biochemical reagents leading to
color variations [25–27]. The absorbance of these biochemical reagents
was measured on pump-free microfluidic chip by our portable absorp-
tion photometry system. The biosensing mechanism were described
briefly as following. TGL in the serum can react with assay reagents
leading to the red quinoneimine solution through the following steps.
TGL is firstly hydrolyzed by lipoprotein lipase to glycerol and free fatty
acids. In the presence of adenosine-5′-triphosphate (ATP) and glycerol
kinase (GK), the glycerol is phosphorylated to glycerol-3-phosphate (G-
3-P) and adenosine-5′-diphosphate (ADP). G-1-P is then oxidized by
glycerol phosphate oxidase (GPO) to dihydroxyacetone phosphate
(DAP) and hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). Finally, peroxidase (POD) cata-
lyzes the condensation of H2O2 with 4-aminoantipyrine (4-AAP) and 4-
chlorophenol to generate a red colored quinoneimine dye that shows an
absorbance maximum at 510 nm. The absorbance of 510 nm is directly
proportional to triglyceride concentration of the sample. To detect the
albumin (ALB) specially, 2.7 × 10−4 M bromocresol purple (BCP) was
used in a solution at a low pH. BCP (greenish-yellow color in aqueous
solution) can bind to ALB by hydrophobic interactions and form the
BCP–ALB complexes (dark green in aqueous solution). In this step, a
proton is transferred from BCP to a carboxyl group of ALB resulting in
dissociated BCP. The amount of BCP–ALB complexes was quantified by
the absorbance of dissociated BCP, which is measured at 600 nm in
aqueous solution. Total protein in the serum is composited of albumin
and globulin. 0.015 mol/L Cupric ions can react with nitrogen pre-
senting in the peptide bonds of proteins and polypeptides to form a
violet colored chelate compound in an alkaline solution. The absor-
bance of the violet colored chelate compound at 540 nm is directly
proportional to the concentration of protein in the sample. A standard
calibration curve can be created from this linear relationship that is
used to calculate the concentration of an unknown sample. The sche-
matic of biosensing mechanism was shown in Fig. 2.
R. Gao et al.
2.5. Absorption photometry detection on pump-free microfluidic system
Absorption photometry detection part is comprised of LED, photo-
diode detector, and AD converter. Once the certain volume of analytes
and assay reagents were added into two inlets of chips with pipette, the
chips were placed into detection system by a slip channel, as shown in
Fig. 1B (xi). The solutions flowed in PDMS channel by capillary force in
5 min. Then the system was started and the average value of five
measurements was recorded. The detection process was repeated three
times for each concentration of analytes. TGL was analyzed by mea-
suring its optical absorbance maxima at 510 nm and sample consump-
tion was 4 μl. ALB was measured at 600 nm as the wavelength corre-
sponded to the absorption spectrum peak and the sample consumption
was 20 μl. TP was detected at 540 nm to reach optical absorbance
maxima and the sample consumption was 6 μl. The volume of solution
in detection chamber was fixed as 90 μl in all measurement. The sample
consumptions of three analytes are varied since the different mixing
ratios of analytes and assay reagents. To detect an unknown human
serum sample, 4 μl, 6 μl, and 20 μl samples were reacted with corre-
sponding assay reagents. ALB test was selected and systematically de-
scribed as an example. 20 ul human serum sample was diluted with 80
ul DI water, and 50 ul 2.7 × 10−4 M BCP reagent was diluted with 50 ul
DI water. Then two diluted solutions were added into two inlets of chip
by pipette. The solutions reacted and formed BCP–ALB complexes in
microfluidic channel. Following by the pump-free microfluidic chip
placed into detection system, LED with 600 nm main wavelength was
turned on and PD detected the light absorbance of BCP–ALB complexes.
Finally, light absorbance was expressed by output voltage value on
OLED screen. The concentration of ALB was calculated from ALB
standard calibration curve using obtained output voltage value.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Microfluidic channel characterization
PDMS has been applied for the fluidic network since its favorable
properties, such as better biocompatibility, optical transparency, easy
fabrication, wide-spread applications and low cost [28]. The surface of
PDMS shows the hydrophobic nature due to the presence of methyl
group. Nevertheless, the biochemical assay generally performed in
aqueous phase. It is a challenge to achieve PDMS surface hydrophilic
and wetting property. As a step towards this, a simple and highly stable
surface treatment method was utilized to produce hydrophilic PDMS
surface as well as a capillary pump to serve as the driving force of the
liquid transportation.
To execute the biochemical assay automatically, fine channel
structure and surface treatment are indispensable. Accordingly, we
designed and fabricated a new microfluidic chip with winding channel
and comb-like structure to perform the TGL, ALB and TP assay. Fig. 3
shows the schematic design of microfluidic chip used in this paper.
Various concentrations of TGL, ALB and TP standard calibrator solu-
tions were added to chip and flowed to hydrophilic channels that can
identify the levels of standard calibrator solutions due to color change
of assay reagents. This chip is mainly composed of four compartments
from up- to downstream. In the first compartment, sample loading was
achieved by introducing liquids into the channel via two inlet re-
servoirs. A 2.6 mm round chamber was used for pre-mix solutions as
shown in Fig. 3(i). The following downstream was a further mixing and
reaction zone. As shown in Fig. 3(ii), a winding-shaped structure was
incorporated into the channel to improve mixing efficiency and form
assay complexes. The stretching and folding of the fluids induced a
chaotic advection effect, which increased species mixing. In the third
compartment, a comb-like structure functioned as a capillary pump to
drive fluids through the entire channel. Meanwhile, the hydrophilic
channels led the movement of fluids upon contact such that a 200 μL
sample could be loaded in less than 8 min. Finally, the fourth unit acted
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Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93
as the storage and detection which the light was easily passed through
the outlet reservoir of assay complexes. A photograph of the whole
microfluidic channel filled with red and blue ink was shown in Fig. 4.
The PDMS microfluidic channel was rendered hydrophilic as a result
of the PEG coating. As demonstrated in Fig. 4, red and blue ink flowed
in the microfluidic channel to test the robustness and hydrophilic
properties of the channel, and no leakage was found during experi-
ments. In our experiments, long-term stability of hydrophilic micro-
fluidic channel surface maintained at least 30 days when stored at room
temperature, and it did not exert dramatically influence on the hydro-
philic property. Consequently, the approaches mentioned above were
able to achieve liquid autonomous transportation in the channel by the
capillary force and hydrophilic coating without using external pumps.
The fluids can fill out the channel within 52 s, as shown in Fig. 4.
3.2. Quantitative analysis of TGL, ALB and TP using portable AP-based
microfluidic system
To validate the AP-based microfluidic system, three important items
(TGL, ALB and TP) were selected from general blood serum test. At first,
the calibration curves were built using standard calibrator solutions
including TGL, ALB, and TP with concentrations respectively ranging
from 0.1 mmol/L to 5.48 mmol/L, 25 g/L to 60 g/L and 50 g/L to 95 g/
L. Specifically, the output voltage was used as blank when the sample
was DI water. In the theory of absorption photometry, the results are
highly related to path length of light through the materials and their
concentrations. Hence, the volume of the sample solutions was fixed in
all measurements for one item. As presented in Fig. 1A, sample from
patient on-site or in-home conditions was introduced into the chip and
mixed with assay reagents. The incident light from LED was focused on
outlet reservoir by an optical lens. The photodiode detector behind the
chip received the transmission light and converted the optical signal
into electrical signal. The incident light intensity was reduced resulting
from the absorbance of assay complexes, and it was proportional to the
concentration of sample. Furthermore, the output voltage value was
directly displayed on the OLED screen. The concentration of sample was
inversely derived from the output voltage value. The data were mea-
sured every 5 s, and simultaneously sent to SD card and OLED. To en-
sure the reproducibility and reliability of this system, 300 measure-
ments of the output voltage were recorded as shown in Fig. S2. It
demonstrated that the variations did not exceed 0.018 V during the test
process. Additionally, the whole system was supplied by a 5 V external
power source and the power consumption was less than 150 mw for one
measurement.
Fig. 5A-C illustrated the absorbance of different concentrations of
TGL, ALB and TP, which showed good linear responses (R2 = 0.991,
0.991, 0.992) that are achieved within the concentrations range of
0.1 mmol/L to 5.48 mmol/L, 25 g/L to 60 g/L and 50 g/L to 95 g/L. It
successfully met the requirements of the clinical detection range of TGL
(0 mmol/L to 1.7 mmol/L), ALB (34 g/L to 50 g/L) and TP (64 g/L to
82 g/L). Based on these results, the validity of our system for TGL, ALB
and TP detection was confirmed. These results evidently proved the
significant utility for clinical biochemical analysis.
To evaluate the selectivity of the portable AP-based microfluidic
system for TGL, ALB and TP, we next investigated the capability of
detecting other antigens, such as prostate-specific antigen (PSA) and
carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), as shown in Fig. S3. It was consistent
with our results described the above, the absorbance was greatly in-
creased for these three items with the corresponding assay reagents
while no obvious changes were observed for any of the other four items.
This phenomenon indicated that the assay reagents only can react with
the corresponding items on our system, and thus the portable AP-based
microfluidic system described in this work is useful for selective
quantification.
R. Gao et al. Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93

Fig. 3. Schematic illustration of the detection progress in microfluidic chip. The chip is mainly composed of four compartments with the following functions: (i) pre-
mixing zone, (ii) reaction zone, (iii) capillary pump zone, (iv) storage and detection zone.

Fig. 4. The photographs of red and blue ink flowed in microfluidic channel according to time (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the
reader is referred to the web version of this article).

3.3. Evaluation of the matrix effect electrolytes, antibodies, antigens, and cytokines [29]. These compo-
nents disturb the sensitive detections of various important biomarkers
Human serum is the most frequently used in clinical biochemical as shown by previous studies [30,31]. To verify the accuracy and sta-
analysis. However, it contains a bunch of components, such as bility of these calibration curves built by standard calibrator solutions,

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R. Gao et al.
Fig. 5. (A) The concentrations of TGL ranged from 0.1 mmol/L to 5.48 mmol/L. Correlation coefficient, R2 = 0.991. (B) The concentrations of ALB ranged from 25 g/
L to 60 g/L. Correlation coefficient, R2 = 0.991. (C) The concentrations of TP ranged from 50 gl/l to 95 g/L. Correlation coefficient, R2 = 0.992. All error bars
indicate standard deviations from these detections. (D–F) Passing-Boblok regression analyses of TGL, ALB and TP between Dimension@ RXL Max ™ and portable AP-
based microfluidic system.
the results of TGL, ALB and TP in human serum and standard calibrator
solution were compared by our system. For evaluation matrix effect, a
clinical sample with test report of Dimension@ RXL Max ™ was used as
reference. The voltages of TGL, ALB and TP in this clinical sample were
obtained from our system and converted into concentrations using the
above calibration curves. Meanwhile, the analytes with same con-
centrations of three items according to test report were prepared and
measured, as shown in Table S1. It obviously demonstrated that the
differentials between two instruments were statistically reliable since
they were very close. Therefore, the matrix effect did not affect the
accuracy and stability of these calibration curves built by standard
calibrator solutions and met clinical testing standards.
3.4. Assessment of the portable AP-based microfluidic system for clinical
samples
In order to further ensure the clinical feasibility of our system, 10
human serums with unknown concentrations were randomly chosen
from hospital and performed. All clinical samples were handled as ap-
proved Institutional Review Board (IRB) protocols at the hospital. The
concentrations of TGL, ALB and TP in human serum samples were de-
termined from the calibration curves mentioned above. Then all clinical
samples were simultaneously tested on Dimension@ RXL Max ™clinical
chemistry system. The results of TGL, ALB and TP measured from our
system were consistent with those measured from the Dimension@ RXL
Max ™ system within the clinical acceptable range, as shown in Table 1.
Passing − Boblok regression analyses between Dimension@ RXL Max ™
and our system were performed to evaluate the similarity as shown in
Fig. 5D-F. It is a statistical and graphical method that allows estimation
of variation and systematic bias between two different analytical
techniques [32]. The plots demonstrated a good agreement between
two analytical systems because the data points showed strong linear
relationships. It showed good conformity between two analytical sys-
tems when the 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the intercept and the
slope included 0 and 1. Owing to the scattered points and regression
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Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93
lines included within the 95% CIs, it was deduced that all values were
in the clinically acceptable ranges. Therefore, it was concluded that the
assay results of clinical samples had confirmed the accuracy and fea-
sibility of our system, and it was acceptable for clinical purposes.
4. Conclusion
Blood serum test is one of the most common test in hospital. The
portable system has the great application on POCT and field detection
area. In this paper, a novel pump-free microfluidic chip with rapid and
reliable hydrophilic surface treatment was developed and integrated
with the portable system. Three important items (TGL, ALB and TP) in
blood serum test were selected and their calibration curves were built
using standard calibrator solutions. To evaluate the clinical feasibility
of our system, absorption photometry detection was performed for 10
clinical samples, and the detection results were compared with those
detected by the commercial system installed in hospital. By applying
the Passing-Boblok regression analyses, it showed a good linear re-
lationship between two systems. The LODs and concentration ranges of
three items well meet the requirement of clinical application. In this
work, we successfully developed a home-built AP-based microfluidic
system for blood serum test. A novel capillary-driven microfluidic
channel was designed to achieve rapid detection. Owing to the appli-
cation of pump-free microfluidic chip, it reduced the instrument size,
sample and time consumptions. Therefore, the portable AP-based mi-
crofluidic system has strong potential as a novel POCT device for rapid
and accurate blood serum test.
Conflicts of interest
There are no conflicts to declare.
Acknowledgements
The National Natural Science Foundation of China supported this
R. Gao et al. Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93

Table 1
™
Comparison of Quantitative Results Determined by Dimension@ RXL Max and Portable AP-based Microfluidic System for 10 Clinical Samples.
TGL (mmol/l) ALB (g/l) TP (g/l)

@ @
Integrated LED-based Dimension RXL Max Integrated LED-based Dimension RXL Max Integrated LED-based Dimension@ RXL Max
TM TM TM
portable system portable system portable system
Sample no. Mean (SD) Values Mean (SD) Values Mean (SD) Values

1 0.776 (0.0046) 0.77 46.031 (0.0046) 45.60 78.835 (0.0108) 78.84

2 7.975 (0.0052) 8.18 41.573 (0.0046) 41.70 91.015 (0.0017) 90.30
3 4.34 (0.003) 4.47 43.502 (0.0105) 43.50 74.331 (0.0076) 74.10
4 0.655 (0.0052) 0.66 35.39 (0.0076) 35.40 60.359 (0.0035) 60.50
5 0.805 (0.0062) 0.81 43.16 (0.0017) 43.10 75.559 (0.0017) 76.10
6 3.01 (0.0062) 3.25 39.43 (0.0046) 39.60 74.331 (0.0046) 74.90
7 1.103 (0.0062) 1.13 39.23 (0.0046) 39.40 76.276 (0.0076) 76.90
8 3.85 (0.0017) 4.44 43.84 (0.0108) 44.00 73.307 (0.006) 74.00
9 1.478 (0.0062) 1.43 43.55 (0.0062) 43.70 74.382 (0.006) 75.00
10 2.34 (0.0076) 2.35 43.48 (0.007) 43.70 79.65 (0.0062) 80.50
Reference range 0 - 1.7 34.00 - 50.00 64.00 - 82.00

work (No. 61601165, 21864011). We also acknowledge financial sup-
port from the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
(No. JZ2016HGBH1052), the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation
(Nos. 2016M590567, 2018T110613), the Anhui Key Project of
Research and Development Plan (No. 1704d0802188).
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary material related to this article can be found, in the
online version, at doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.snb.2019.01.065.
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Rongke Gao received Ph.D. degree from Department of Bionano Engineering, Hanyang
University in 2015. He is currently an associate professor with School of Instrument
Science and Opto-Electronics Engineering, Hefei University of Technology. He has pub-
lished more than 20 research papers. His research interest is mainly centered on the
development of highly sensitive optical detection technologies on microfluidic platform,
and its applications of biomedical sensor, nano science and CTCs sorting.
Yuanmeng Wu is a master’s candidate in Biomedicial Engineering, Hefei University of
Technology. Her research is focused on medical instrument and sensor.
Jing Huang received her M.D. degree from Wannan medical College in 1983. She is
currently an associate professor with Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine,
Hefei University of Technology Hospital. Her research interest focuses on development of
clinical test instrument and new technique.
Le Song received her bachelor degree from Hefei University of Technology in 2015. Now
she is a Ph.D. candidate in School of Instrument Science and Opto-electronic Engineering,
Hefei University of Technology. Her research work focuses on the micromixing in

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microfluidic devices and related applications.
Haiyang Qian received his bachelor degree from Northeast Forestry University in 2017.
Now he is a master’s candidate in Biomedicial Engineering, Hefei University of
Technology. His research work is focus on Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy based
microfluidic chip.
Xuefei Song received his bachelor degree from China University of Mining and
Technology in 2017. Now, he is a master’s candidate in Biomedicial Engineering, Hefei
University of Technology. His research focuses on the detection of explosives based on
Surface enhanced Raman scattering and microfluidic chip.
Lei Cheng received his bachelor degree from Wannan medical College in 2017. Now he is
a master’s candidate in Biomedicial Engineering, Hefei University of Technology. His
research work is focus on circulating tumor cell sorting on microfluidic chip.
Rui Wang is currently an assistant professor at Institute of Functional Materials and
Molecular Imaging, Hainan Medical University. He received his PhD at Hnayang
University in 2018. His research interests focus on the bionano materials and Raman
imaging.
Lin-Bao Luo received M.Sc in inorganic chemistry at Department at Chemistry,
University of Science and Technology of China under the supervision of Prof. Shu-Hong
Yu in 2006, and Ph. D. Degree from Department of Physics and Materials Sciences, City
University of Hong Kong under the guidance of Prof. Shuit-Tong Lee in 2009. After
spending one and half years at the same group as a research associate, he joined the
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Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical 286 (2019) 86–93
School of Electronic Sciences and Applied Physics, Hefei University of Technology, where
he is now a full professor of applied physics. He has published more than 100 peer re-
ferred journals (e.g.Adv. Mater. Laser & Photonics Rev., Opt. Express, ACS Nano etc), with
a total citation of 3300 and an h-index of 29. His research interest mainly focuses on
controlled fabrication of graphene and low-dimensional semiconductor nanostructures
for high-performance optoelectronic and electronic devices application including pho-
todetectors, photovoltaic devices, and non-volatile memory devices etc.
Gang Zhao received his B.S. and Ph.D. degrees in power engineering and engineering
thermophysics from University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) in 1999 and
2004, respectively. He was a Japan Society for Promotion of Science (JSPS) Research
Fellow from July 2008 to October 2010. Since April 2011, he has been a Professor at
Biomedical Engineering Research Center of USTC. He has published over 120 full-length
journal papers and he holds more than 16 China Patents. Dr. Zhao is a member of the
Board of Governors of the Society for Cryobiology, and an editor of the journal
Biopreservation and Biobanking. His research interests include biomedical microsystems,
biosensors, bioMEMS, micro- and nanotechnologies, and cryo-biomedical engineering.
Liandong Yureceived the Ph.D. degree from the Hefei University of Technology (HFUT),
Hefei, China, in 2003. From 2001 to 2002, he was invited by Physikalisch-Technischen
Bundesanstalt as a Guest Scientist. From 2006 to 2007, he was a Visiting Researcher with
the University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia. Since 2009, he has been a
Full Professor with HFUT, where he is currently the Dean of the School of Instrument
Science and Opto-Electronics Engineering. His current research interests include precision
engineering, optical measurement, and microfluidics.