This course addresses the current advances being made in micro-electro-mechanical-systems- (MEMS-) based instrumentation which deal with increasing the throughput of established processes, and also looks at a future application, that of providing information and capabilities to the physician that are not available today. The course provides an introduction to immunoassays, nucleic-acid-based assays, such as PCR and RCA, and array-based hybridization assays. One desirable goal for BioMEMS-based instrumentation would be to determine the ailment of a patient while he/she is in the physician's office, such as viral, bacterial (including antibiotic resistance or susceptibility, etc.), parasite, or "none of the above" (which requires a background genetic "fingerprint" of each patient). Armed with genetic information about infections and the patient, and after determining the biomarkers for allergies, exposure to toxins, as well as those for infections, the physician could select which medicines/treatments would be the most efficacious.

This course will address both the current advances being made in microelectromechanical-systems- (MEMS-) based instrumentation which deal with increasing the throughput of established processes, and will also look at future applications, that of providing information and capabilities to the physician that are not available today. The course will provide an introduction to immunoassays, nucleic-acid-based assays, such as PCR and RCA, and array-based hybridization assays. One desirable goal for BioMEMS-based instrumentation would be to determine the ailment of a patient while he/she is in the physician's office, such as viral, bacterial (including antibiotic resistance or susceptibility, etc.), parasite, or "none of the above."