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Highly accurate rapid diagnostic test developed for cereal

The mycotoxin detective

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Biochip manufacture: a pipetting robot applies precisely dosed drops of various mycotoxins to a chip in a fully automatic procedure. The mycotoxins are attached to the surface of the chip by another protein.

Mycotoxins – the metabolic products of molds in food – can lead to massive problems in humans and animals, including acute symptoms of poisoning, nerve damage and immune disorders, as well as a higher risk of cancer. Legislators therefore recently issued maximum limits for certain toxins in unprocessed cereals. Current tests for determining toxin values either take too long or are relatively imprecise because they do not provide information on mycotoxin content. Yet this is about to change: the specialists from Bayer CropScience have developed a measurement system that provides precise results within 20 minutes.

Technology borrowed from medical diagnostics

The system uses a small biochip based on waveguide technology that was developed by Bayer for medical diagnostics. The chip can test several toxins at the same time, and other fields of application in food diagnostics are conceivable as well. Read the following article to learn about the principle on which the new process is based.