Sharma, Sandhya

In recent years, point-of-care (POC) microfluidic platforms have transformed the healthcare landscape as they offer rapid, low-cost, and easy operational benefits. POC diagnostics play an important role in expediting the testing process in resource-constrained areas. These platforms have become a powerful tool as they offer comparable results with gold-standard methods. The gold standard methods require sophisticated lab locations and expensive equipment, to process the samples which is a significant challenge particularly for people living in low-income countries. To address these limitations, herein, in my dissertation, I have developed POC microfluidic platforms that can be operated outside the laboratory using lesser equipment statistically hence reducing the testing cost and time. The developed POC chips are used for infectious diseases diagnosis for viruses such as Zika, Hepatitis C Virus (HCV), and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2). The entire virus detection process was executed inside a uniquely designed, inexpensive, disposable self-driven microfluidic chip with high sensitivity and specificity. In addition to this, I have also developed a microfluidic platform for functional sperm cell sorting from raw semen samples. The microfluidic chip offers a platform where the sperm cells experience different shear stress in different parts of the chip that facilitates isolation of competent sperm cells without impacting their integrity. Simultaneously, it also allows effortless collection of sorted sperm cells from the collection chamber which holds clinical significance. All things considered, the developed devices are inexpensive, disposable, easy-to-use, and rapid that provide results within one hour.

The 3MT® competition celebrates the exciting research conducted by graduate students. Developed by The University of Queensland (UQ), the exercise cultivates students’ academic, presentation, and research communication skills. The competition supports their capacity to effectively explain their research in three minutes, in language appropriate to a non-specialist audience. The first 3MT® competition was held at the University of Queensland in 2008 with 160 students competing. In 2009 and 2010 the 3MT® competition was promoted to other Australian and New Zealand universities and enthusiasm for the concept grew. Since 2011, the popularity of the competition has increased and 3MT® competitions are now held in over 170 universities across more than 18 countries worldwide.

The research efforts refer to tracking homologus loci in the chromosomes of a pair of a species. The purpose is to infer the extent of maximum syntenic correlation when an exhaustive set of orthologs of the species are searched. Relevant bioinformatic analyses use comparative mapping of conserved synteny via Oxford grid. In medical diagnostic efforts, deducing such synteny correlation can help screening chromosomal aberration in genetic disorder pathology. Objectively, the present study addresses: (i) Cytogenetic framework of syntenic correlation and, (ii) applying information-theoretics to determine entropy-dictated synteny across an exhaustive set of orthologs of the test pairs of species.