Applied Nanodetectors exhibited last week at the Innovate 11 conference at the Business Design Centre in London.  This was the Technology Strategy Board’s annual event which is focused on challenge-led and technology innovation. The  key themes were health & wellbeing, high value manufacturing, agri-food, digital, energy, travel & transport and the built environment. We showcased out work on breath analysis for use as a point of care diagnostic for respiratory diseases, we were overwhelmed with interest about our sensor solution and we talked to close to 100 visitors about our recent research and development.

https://connect.innovateuk.org/web/innovate-11

Last week Dr. Victor Higgs presented at the Nano4sport meeting, which took place on the 21st September at the Institute of Materials in London. This meeting  was organized by the Nanotechnology KTN and the main objective of this event  was to focus on the exploitation of nanotechnology for sport, and to facilitate the interaction between the scientific and design communities. Following our presentation there was a significant interest in the application of our nanosensors for use in sports and health products. There were also a number of key presentations from multinational companies and the key presentation was from Speedo who gave an interesting overview of their product portfolio and discussed some of their future requirements.

http://nanotechweb.org/cws/article/tech/47281

Applied Nanodetectors were recently featured in a supplement on mHealth for the Sunday Telegraph (April 17th, www.lyonsdown.co.uk/publications/2011/ehealth.pdf). The supplement focuses on the use of mHealth and how it is being used in the UK. It covers our work on developing mobile health solutions for patients suffering from asthma.

Dr. Victor Higgs managing Director of Applied Nanodetectors gave an invited talk at the 2010 Technology World/UK NanoForum conference  at London’s ExCeL centre on December 7th. This event showcased UK science & technology and attracted more than 1,000 visitors from all around the world during the two day meeting. Dr Higgs also discussed their new business developments with Mark Prisk the Business and Enterprise Minister. The minister attended the conference to meet the UK’s top businesses in technology and innovation.

There are an estimated 11 million people with tuberculosis (TB) in the world, with nearly 2 million deaths occurring annually. In the UK TB rates are at a ten year high, with over 3,000 cases reported in London last year. Conventional methods of diagnosis such as smear microscopy and culture testing are time consuming and require skilled professionals. Global figures from the World Health Organisation suggest that less than two thirds of the 9 million new cases each year are detected. The use of rapid point of care test POCT would be of enormous benefit, such tests can improve patient outcomes by ensuring patients are treated early, thereby reducing the chance of complications and increased healthcare costs. Importantly, it would also reduce the opportunity for transmission and spread of this highly infectious disease. However, there a number of challenges to overcome before such tests are freely available in the countries that have the highest disease burden. Ideal POCT need to be cheap, simple, robust, and could be implemented in countries which have minimal infrastructure but also delivering the optimum performance. Nano technology based point of care tests have the potential to address these requirements they could also detect analytes at molecular levels and can be configured to detect and differentiate among multiple biomarkers.

Applied Nanodetectors a leading developer in the field of nanosenor technology for early disease detection has recently won a Technology Strategy Board Grant award in the Fighting Infection Through Detection funding competition in collaboration with the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM). Their project is to work with Dr. Ruth McNerney (LSHTM), to develop a real time point of care test to detect TB using a nanosensor array to detect TB in patient samples. This type of new test could be used to detect individuals with TB allowing rapid isolation of infectious patients and accelerating access to treatment. Current rapid tests are inadequate they lack sensitivity and or specificity and usually require laboratory infrastructure and personnel with specialist skills.

Dr. Victor Higgs Managing Director of Applied Nanodetectors said “This is a great opportunity to work with world leading researchers to develop a new ultrasensitive test for TB. We will design nanosensor solutions and LSHTM will provide expertise in TB diagnosis”.

Ruth McNerney (LSHTM) said “we are delighted to have this opportunity to explore the potential of nanosenor technology to help control of one the world’s most deadly diseases”.