Isothermal real time DNA amplification instrument

Abstract

The world of open source hardware has not yet made its way to the field of biotechnology. This is mainly due to high development costs of equipment as well as governmental regulations on hardware to be used in diagnostic purposes. If one can only concentrate on research use only instrumentation, one can forget the governmental regulations. In this work an open source hardware for research purposes is presented that can run LAMP (Loop Mediated Isothermal Amplification) reactions to amplify DNA with real time detection of reaction using inexpensive optics. miriam is designed to heat a 96-well plate to a desired temperature and to maintain the temperature to enable isothermal amplification conditions. There is also a top heating plate to prohibit condensation. The optical setup is realized by using 96 LEDs alongside with 96 photodiodes that are separated from each other with an emission filter used in theatrical illumination. miriam can successfully use calcein as a fluorophore to record LAMP reaction and with a slight modification also SYBR green could be utilized as a fluorophore in assays. The design documents for miriam are publicly available (https://github.com/miroculus/Miriam) and the production costs per piece are below 200$.