Spotlight Publication: “High contrast cleavage detection for enhancing porous silicon sensor sensitivity” published in Optics Express
“High contrast cleavage detection for enhancing porous silicon sensor sensitivity” published in Optics Express has been selected as a VINSE spotlight publication.
About the author: Rabeb Layouni is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering under the direction of Dr. Sharon Weiss and Dr. Paul Laibinis. Rabeb studies the development of porous silicon (PSi) optical sensors for complex media biosensing and aims to help transition this technology from benchtop to commercialization and clinical implementation. In recently published work carried out in collaboration with researchers at SiPhox Inc., MIT, and RIT, she demonstrated a novel detection mechanism that takes advantage of the optical properties of high contrast quantum dots and porous silicon thin films to achieve enzymatic DNA cleavage-based target detection. The developed sensor showed improved sensitivity compared to previously studied DNA porous silicon assays and is a first step towards the development of CRISPR-Cas-PSi sensing devices for infectious disease diagnostics.