Grant: Strategic Projects - Group

This NSERC Strategic project proposal by DALSA Semiconductor (Bromont, QC) and the Departments of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at the Universities of Sherbrooke (UoS) and Alberta (UoA) aims at developing highly integrated microchip-based systems for performing health care and life science diagnostics. Much work has been done in developing such microfluidics-based analysis system, variously termed micro-total-analysis-systems (uTAS), "lab on a chip", or BioMEMS systems. To date, however, most efforts have typically relied upon extensive (and expensive) external instrumentation, with comparatively little functionality integrated directly onto the chip itself. The goal of the present proposal is to miniaturize existing external instrumentation and integrate it directly onto a microfluidic chip, in order to produce a single chip BioMEMS standalone life sciences diagnostic platform. Doing so has many benefits, most notably making such diagnostic systems more accessible to health care providers, researchers and the public through reduced cost and portability. From a commercial standpoint, this strategic partnership between DALSA Semiconductor and UofA/UdeS will translate into globally competitive technologies at DALSA Semiconductor and further contribute to making Canada a major player in this area on the world stage.