Development of a Molecular Point-Of-Care Test for Hepatitis B Virus (HBV) Infection

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a blood-borne pathogen that infects the liver. One of the molecular diagnostic tools to detect HBV DNA is Loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP), a novel technique for amplifying target nucleic acid. It relies on four to six specifically designed primers and a DNA polymerase enzyme with high strand displacement activity; the reaction occurs at a constant temperature of around 65°C. It is simple, rapid, and cost-effective. This research project developed LAMP assay that enabled the direct detection of HBV nucleic acid in human blood using point-of-care testing platform that can be deployed in resource-constrained areas.