Molecular genetics makes early diagnostics of several diseases possible. So far, however, in most cases complex analyses in the laboratory are necessary to enable this. The scientists at the Fraunhofer EMFT and the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden are currently working on cost-effective miniature labs on foil, poised for a fast point-of-care diagnostics. Cancer is still one of the scariest threats for most people. It is still the second most common cause of death in Germany, as communicated by the federal office of statistics on the world cancer day in February this year. Admittedly, several alternatives for effective treatment already exist, but in most cases the therapy success and chances of recovery greatly depend on detecting the disease at an early stage. The illness leaves its marks in the human body long before the first symptoms occur - they can be detected, for example by taking a very deep look into the microcosmos of a single cell on DNA level. Molecular genetic analyses offer great potential for giving the physicians a time advantage in the battle against cancer. An example: Certain single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) - alterations in single base pairs of our DNA - can be associated to certain types of cancer. Scientists have also detected a correlation between another SNP and diabetes. Further, molecular genetics opens up new possibilities for fighting dangerous infectious diseases such as malaria. So far, viruses and bacteria are generally detected via antibodies in the blood of the patient, meaning they can only be detected after a certain incubation period. However, direct detection of the pathogenic DNA not only makes earlier detection of the infection possible but also enables exact determination of the specific subtype of the pathogen.
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