Scientists develop new disposable USB Memory Stick to measure HIV (Photos)

A group of scientists from Imperial College London and DNA Electronics,
have developed a disposable USB Memory Stick that can take a drop of
blood to determine the amount of HIV Virus in the blood. According to
the Washington Post, the revolutionary gadget
can be plunged into a
laptop or other electronic devices to detect a patient’s HIV virus
quantity and status through the help of electrical signals.

The scientists disclosed that if the technology is
perfected, it could identify all sorts of foreign invaders in the blood
from hepatitis, bacterial and fungal sepsis. It will also be able to
measure the levels of HIV virus in a human’s system and help to
determine if a medication is effective on the virus or to change to
other drugs:

“At the moment, testing often requires
costly and complex equipment that
can take a couple of days to produce a result. We have taken the job
done by this equipment, which is the size of a large photocopier, and
shrunk it down to a USB chip,” said Graham Cooke, one of the study
authors and a clinician scientist in Imperial’s Department of Medicine.

So just like your other take-home medical kits used at home, you can now
measure the amount of HIV in your blood as easily as you can check your
weight on the scale in your bathroom, run a blood sugar level test or 
take your blood pressure using a home cuff, all at home.



However, the scientists have not disclosed when the new gadget will be available in the market.