3D-printed hand-operated centrifuge enables biological testing in remote areas
20 June 2019
Another Spin
A disc spinning between two loops of string, the whirligig, is a 5000-year-old toy returning over the centuries in different forms – the latest will save lives. This 3D-printed version is modified to hold tiny tubes of biological samples like saliva or blood. When it spins it acts like a tiny centrifuge – whirling samples at up to 6000 rotations per minute and pulling dense particles or cells downwards, separating biological samples into fractions for further analysis. Vital to medical diagnoses, lab-based centrifuges are expensive and require power, while the whirligig centrifuge, dubbed the 3D-fuge, is completely hand operated. Previously taken for a spin in the rainforests of Peru – where it helped to extract DNA to identify plant species – the 3D-fuge could also form part of a portable lab used in remote areas to test patients for conditions like malaria.
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- Image by Rob Felt, Georgia Tech
- Research from The Bhamla Lab, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA
- Image copyright held by the photographer
- Research published in PLOS Biology, May 2019
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