Cunningham oversees new technological developments for Center for Genomic Diagnostics

1/30/2020 Allie Arp, CSL

Illinois ECE Professor Brian Cunningham is overseeing new technological developments at the Center for Genomic Diagnostics to help detect diseases including cancer and the Zika virus.

Written by Allie Arp, CSL

During the last decade, the Holonyak Micro & Nanotechnology Laboratory and Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology (IGB) have partnered together to use computational bioinformatics, biosensing instruments, and biochemistry to develop new ways to diagnose cancer. Now, Illinois ECE Professor Brian T CunninghamDonald Biggar Willett Professor in Engineering, is supervising the new technological developments at  the Center for Genomic Diagnostics for detecting diseases.

 

Brian T Cunningham
Brian T Cunningham

After finding success, the group began expanding its efforts to include other diseases, resulting in the formation of the Center for Genomic Diagnostics. The Center for Genomic Diagnostics will focus on building new platforms for detecting different types of diseases, including cancer, the Zika virus, and others.

 

The Center will have touch points with many different parts of campus including the Cancer Center at Illinois, which is leveraging science, technology, and engineering to advance cancer detection, prevention, diagnosis, therapy, and quality of life.

“We recognize that molecules are capable of detecting nucleic acids, proteins, or metabolites, which can have relevance to not only cancer, but also to many other things,” said Cunningham, director of the Center for Genomic Diagnostics and Holonyak Lab.

The goal of the center is to take a more comprehensive look at how to build new devices capable of detecting biomarkers in bodily fluids. Once detected, the fluids, such as urine, saliva, and spinal fluid, can inform researchers about a variety of biological processes, some of which are involved with disease development and detection. By detecting nucleic acid molecules in bodily fluids, researchers will be able to identify cancer mutations, infectious diseases, viruses, and even psychological stress markers.

The Center for Genomic Diagnostics is currently funded by the Grainger College of Engineering and IGB, with project-specific funding from the National Institutes of Health. One NIH project involves building a smartphone detection platform for Zika, Dengue and Chikungunya viruses, though the device could be leveraged to identify many types of viruses or bacteria.

“While the center will be an important component of the Cancer Center at Illinois, we’re expanding our scope to monitor health and wellness in the clinic at the point of care,” said Cunningham. “This organization will impact many different parts of patient care and the research will touch many different parts of campus.”

The center plans to host a symposium in the spring of 2020. To read more about the Center for Genomic Diagnostics, IGB click here.

Check out the original article on the MNTL site.


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This story was published January 30, 2020.