A device developed by Massachusetts General Hospital investigators provides rapid, accurate molecular diagnosis of tumors and other diseases. The smartphone-based technology collects detailed microscopic images for digital analysis of the molecular composition of cells and tissues.
The D3 (digital diffraction diagnosis) system features an imaging module with a battery-powered LED light. The light is clipped onto a standard smartphone that records high-resolution imaging data with its camera.
In a single image, data can be recorded on more than 100,000 cells from a blood or tissue sample. The data is then transmitted for analysis to a remote graphic-processing server via a secure, encrypted cloud service.
For molecular analysis of tumors, a sample of blood or tissue is labeled with microbeads that bind to known cancer-related molecules; the sample is then loaded into the D3 imaging module. The presence of specific molecules is detected by analyzing the diffraction patterns generated by the microbeads.
The use of variously sized or coated beads may offer unique diffraction signatures to facilitate detection. A numerical algorithm developed by the research team for the D3 platform distinguishes cells from beads and analyzes as much as 10 MB of data in less than nine hundredths of a second.
