The invention relates to methods for operating a microfluidic device in the analysis of sample substances, comprising: (i) providing the microfluidic device, which contains an array of separate sensor spots; (ii) addressing a first selection of the sensor spots with sample substances taken up in fluid, said first selection not comprising the whole array of sensor spots; (iii) optically sensing of the first selection of sensor spots for an interaction with the sample substances; (iv) changing the operation of the microfluidic device in response to the optically sensed interaction, by addressing a second selection of the sensor spots with the sample substances taken up in fluid, said second selection not being identical to the first selection, and (v) analyzing the sample substances by optical sensing of a third selection of sensor spots which is part of the second selection. The invention likewise relates to a corresponding arrangement with microfluidic device.

This disclosure presents a docking station into which a test card can be inserted for rapid analyte detection and reporting. This docking station has portable capability and can include wire or wireless transmission to a local server or cloud-based server. A test card that has a test structure located on the test structure that includes a modified waveguide can be inserted into the and a docking station that includes a laser and interferometer provides for accurate and rapid detection of a test sample.

An optical sensor system, comprising refractory plasmonic elements that can withstand temperatures exceeding 2500° C. in chemically aggressive and harsh environments that impose stress, strain and vibrations. A plasmonic metamaterial or metasurface, engineered to have a specific spectral and angular response, exhibits optical reflection characteristics that are altered by varying physical environmental conditions including but not limited to temperature, surface chemistry or elastic stress, strain and other types of mechanical load. The metamaterial or metasurface comprises a set of ultra-thin structured layers with a total thickness of less than tens of microns that can be deployed onto surfaces of devices operating in harsh environmental conditions. The top interface of the metamaterial or metasurface is illuminated with a light source, either through free space or via an optical fiber, and the reflected signal is detected employing remote detectors.

Herein is reported a method for determining the binding affinity of the binding sites of a bivalent full length antibody of the human IgG1 subclass to a homo-multimeric antigen comprising the steps of i) incubating a mixture comprising the antibody and a polypeptide that is derived from lysine-gingipain of Porphyromonas gingivalis at a pH of from pH 7.5 to pH 8.5, in the presence of a reducing agent, at a temperature of from 30° C. to 42° C., for time of from 10 min. to 240 min. to cleave the antibody into Fabs and Fc-region, and ii) determining the binding affinity of the Fabs of the antibody for its antigen using a surface plasmon resonance method by directly applying the incubated reaction mixture obtained in the previous step in the surface plasmon resonance method and therewith determining the binding affinity of the binding sites of the bivalent full length antibody of the human IgG1 subclass.

An optical sensor device includes a multilayer hollow waveguide device having a hollow waveguide tube layer, an intermediate layer provided inside the hollow waveguide tube layer, and a metal oxide coating layer inside the intermediate layer.

A surface enhanced luminescence analyte interrogation stage may include a substrate and an array of pillars projecting from the substrate. Each of the pillars may include a polymeric post formed from a first material and a cap on the polymeric post. The cap has a plasmonic surface and is formed from a second material different than the first. A sacrificial coating covers the cap of each of the pillars.

A specimen containing a substance to be measured is introduced into a flow path of a measurement chip including a flow path which is a cavity for accommodating liquid and a reflecting unit which specularly reflects light which passes through the flow path so as to pass through the flow path again and a measurement value indicating an amount of the substance to be measured in the specimen is acquired. Then, second light acquired when first light including light of a wavelength absorbed by a red blood cell passes through the specimen in the flow path, is reflected by the reflecting unit, and passes through the specimen in the flow path again is detected in a state in which the specimen is present in the flow path. Next, a hematocrit value of the specimen is determined on the basis of a detection result of the second light. Next, a measurement value is corrected on the basis of the hematocrit value.

A field-enhancing device includes at least one metal layer or a metal grating consisting of metal stripes or a dielectric grating. Usually the device is constructed on some substrate. The adhesive layer is advantageous when the next layer is metallic but is not needed with dielectric layers. The next layers to be constructed form a mirror structure that can also be omitted for simple field-enhancing device constructs. The mirror structure can be either a metal mirror structure or a distributed Bragg reflector structure (DBR). The next layer is the thin metal layer. This layer can be covered with a 1-D metal grating consisting of metal stripes or with a dielectric grating having similar geometry. The structure can also be fabricated without metals when dielectric grating is used as the field-enhancing part. Finally, a protective layer can be added on top of the structure.

A spectroscopic analysis device includes: a light source configured to emit light for irradiating a specimen; a prism stuck to the specimen and configured to totally reflect the light emitted from the light source; a polarizing separation element configured to separate the light totally reflected by the prism into a first and second polarized light components that are orthogonal to each other; a wavelength dispersing element configured to disperse respective wavelength components of the first and second polarized light components that are separated by the polarizing separation element; an image capturing element configured to capture respective images of the first and second polarized light components that are dispersed by the wavelength dispersing element; and a processing unit configured to perform component analysis on the specimen by obtaining an absorbency at each wavelength by using an imaging signal output from the image capturing element.

A spectroscopic analysis device includes: a light source configured to emit light for irradiating a specimen; a prism stuck to the specimen and configured to totally reflect the light emitted from the light source; a polarizing separation element configured to separate the light totally reflected by the prism into a first and second polarized light components that are orthogonal to each other; a wavelength dispersing element configured to disperse respective wavelength components of the first and second polarized light components that are separated by the polarizing separation element; an image capturing element configured to capture respective images of the first and second polarized light components that are dispersed by the wavelength dispersing element; and a processing unit configured to perform component analysis on the specimen by obtaining an absorbency at each wavelength by using an imaging signal output from the image capturing element.