Design and Implementation of the Control Circuit and Driver for a Cassette-Based Fully Automated Nucleic Acid Analyzer

One of key challenges in prevention and control of infectious diseases is developing effective tools for on-site pathogen detection. To address this challenge, recently, we have developed a fully automated nucleic acid analysis platform, which integrates all detecting steps from biological sample processing (cell lysis, nucleic acid purification) to sample analysis (real-time PCR) into an enclosed disposable cassette. Here, we presented the design and implementation of the control circuit and driver for the highly integrated cassette-based analyzer. The proposed design uses a programmable microcontroller unit (MCU) STM32F103ZET6 to control the timing of all operations including positioning, pipetting, magnetic separation, temperature control and communication. A prototype system is implemented to verify the design. Experimental results show that the designed circuit and driver can meet the needs of rapid pathogen detection, and the detection result can be obtained within two hours.