Micro chemistry chip could remake testing

Arkansas Business, July 26, 2004 by Worth Sparkman

Technology from SFC Fluidics LLC, a client of Fayetteville's Virtual Incubation Co., has received patents from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and has more pending, through research partner Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, for its magneto-hydrodynamics (MHD) process.

Microfluidics is the technology of controlling fluid flow through extremely small spaces. One application of MHD microfluidic technology could be used for on-the-spot blood analysis that would benefit everyone from soldiers on a battlefield to doctors looking to screen for diseases, Calvin Goforth, VIC's president, said.

The company has already received one Phase I small business innovation research award from NASA valued at $70,000 and is applying for a Phase II SBIR valued at $600,000.

Goforth called the technology a "laboratory on a chip." A blood or saliva sample, he said, could be taken in a doctor's office and set on the MHD fluidics chip, which is about the size of a soda cracker. Then the chip could be plugged into an analyzer the size of a laptop computer. Common tests such as cholesterol checks could be done in minutes versus the days it takes now to get results back from a lab. The used chip would even be inexpensive enough to discard, Goforth said.