An integrated microfluidic system for detection of live bacteria by using ethidium monoazide and loop-mediated isothermal amplification

Diagnosis of periprosthetic joint infection (PJI) is a clinical challenge for implant surgery. In this work, a new integrated microfluidic system by using ethidium monoazide (EMA) treatment and loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) was reported for fast diagnosis of PJI. It is the first time that EMA and LAMP approaches are used for detection of "live" bacteria in joint fluids. Furthermore, this whole diagnostic process including sample pretreatment, DNA amplification and optical detection was automatically performed on the integrated microfluidic chip by using a compact custom-made system. Therefore, this detection method of PJI is potentially feasible for on-site diagnosis.