The employment of magnetic technology makes the device impervious to sample background interferences as there is no presence of magnetic content in biological matrices. Additionally, the magnetic labeling process eliminates the standard time-consuming sample preparation. The sample goes through an automatic sample preparation module were the target bacteria is captured and concentrated, followed by a bacteria detection step.
Magnomics start-up members Dr. Filipe Cardoso, Dr. José Germano, Dr. Verónica Romão, and Sofia Martins also contributed to the device development.Bactometer project won a 10.000€ prize at ‘Portugal 2022 eAwards’, awarded by the NTT DATA FOUNDATION. It represented Portugal in the Global eAwards final, held in Madrid . Although it wasn’t the winner, it was among the 15 winning projects from Europe and Latin America which is an important achievement.
Ana Rita Soares – development of the magnetic Bactometer sensors, in microfluidics and in the biological labeling of the target analytes.It is estimated that multidrug-resistant bacteria cause about 4.5 million hospital infections every year in Europe. Every day, patients colonized with multidrug-resistant bacteria who are seen in the Intensive Care Units of hospitals for treatment of other acute conditions introduce these microorganisms into the hospital environment.