Chris Toumazou professor of biomedical engineering at imperial college gives this wonderful talk at TEDMED 2011. His team developed a silicon chip that can detect genetic mutations in saliva in about 20 minutes. He demonstrates a single use collection and application device that places the extracted DNA onto a chip that has been programmed to look for a specific mutation. Plus the chip can also biologically amplify the sample. The chip is placed into a USB stick an plugged into a laptop for power and to read out the results of the test. Professor Toumazou said that biological systems are analog in nature and follow the Boltzmann current flow laws that current in a transistor follow. This technology and others are being commercialized by Toumaz which was founded by the professor.
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