Tool/Machine

Chun Huh from the University of Texas at Austin in the U.S. will develop a malaria diagnostic test that can detect low levels of the parasite in saliva samples for use in resource-poor settings. Diagnosing malaria usually requires taking blood, which can be unsafe, difficult to do in children, and forbidden in certain cultures. Non-invasive tests that use saliva exist but are not sensitive enough to detect everyone with the disease or they require expensive and complex methods to increase the sensitivity.

Paul Mayer at the University of Ottawa in Canada will test whether a portable infrared (FTIR) spectrometer can detect fake or substandard medicines such as antibiotics in resource-poor settings. Many medicines are not what they claim to be on the packet, but they are bought and used particularly in developing countries with sometimes deadly consequences. The extent of this drug fraud is difficult to estimate because of the lack of methods that can quickly determine the quality of a drug at the point-of-sale without the need for sophisticated equipment.

Peter Lillehoj of Michigan State University in the U.S. will develop a low-cost skin patch that can rapidly and safely detect malaria. Current diagnostics for malaria generally require the extraction of blood, which is painful and prohibited in certain cultures. The patch will consist of an array of microneedles that painlessly collects interstitial fluid from just beneath the skin surface that is known to contain proteins from the malaria parasite in infected individuals. This sample will then be transferred to a lateral flow test strip that carries a malaria protein-specific antibody.

Oscar Noya at the Instituto de Medicina Tropical in Venezuela will develop a simple, low-cost test based on the detection of parasite antigens that can be used to diagnose malaria in low-resource settings. They have developed a multi-antigen blot assay that can diagnose 26 diseases at the same time using saliva or small volumes of blood at low cost without the need for specialized equipment. They will use bioinformatics tools to select synthetic peptides from the malaria-causing parasite Plasmodium falciparum, and from other common pathogens such as HIV and dengue virus.

Daniel Chiu from the University of Washington in the U.S. will develop a simple assay for use in low-resource settings to determine HIV load, which is critical for optimally treating patients. HIV load is determined by amplifying the RNA of the virus using a polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Current assays use enzymes that require cycles of precise temperatures and thus expensive equipment.

Kirill Alexandrov of the University of Queensland in Australia will develop a low-cost diagnostic that uses well-established glucose biosensors to detect DNA of infectious pathogens. The biosensor will be built by splitting the enzyme glucose dehydrogenase in half, and attaching each half to a protein that is engineered by zinc-finger nuclease technology to bind a specific sequence of DNA in a pathogen. In the presence of that pathogen, the enzyme becomes whole and reacts with glucose to produce an electric current that can be read by portable electronic devices including smartphones.

Stephen Rogerson from the University of Melbourne in Australia will develop a low-cost diagnostic using an electrical immunosensor platform that can detect very low levels of the malaria parasite in blood and saliva samples to aid malaria-elimination efforts. The platform detects changes in electrical impedance caused by the binding of two molecules, and they postulate that it can improve the limit of detection of current related diagnostic tests by up to 1000 fold.

Edom Tsegaye of Kifiya Financial Technology in Ethiopia will promote the use of mobile money in Ethiopia by enabling merchants to both accept digital payments from customers and provide them with associated services such as prepaying so they can make digital payments elsewhere. Mobile money is practical and safe but is still not being commonly used. This approach will promote uptake as well as simplifying and accelerating the process by cutting out the need for an agent network. It will also provide merchants with additional income.

Michael Oluwagbemi from Loftyinc Allied Partners Limited in Nigeria is developing an affordable mobile phone-based payment card reader with an array of functions (ProNov) so that poor, small-scale retailers in Nigeria can accept digital payments from customers, and better manage their businesses to reduce costs. Low-income retailers handle around 90% of transactions in Nigeria, but many have no way of accepting card payments.

Jonathan Gikabu of Equity Group Foundation in Kenya will incorporate near field communication (NFC) tags into low-cost mobile phones for secure mobile money payments. NFC tags enable short-range wireless communication between mobile phones and other devices for contactless and rapid mobile payments. They are commonly incorporated into smartphones, but these are too expensive for the average citizen in developing countries. He will assemble ultrathin NFC ferrite sheet antennas affixed to the back of SIM cards into inexpensive handsets, and analyze them for making payments and for security.