Dielectica traverses through the literature on this topic – and summarizes as they appear.
Key Words: SERS, Gallbladder, Gold Nanostructure, Nickel foam
Human body is believed to be a well developed machine that can perform complex operations. Gallbladder is a very important part of human organ system. It accumulates particular fluid called ‘bile’ which can break down the fat present in the consumed food and thus helps digestion process. However, any problem in the Gallbladder system can create several health problems such as severe abdominal pain, jaundice, gallstones. In extreme cases when the growth of stones is dominant, patients are left with the option of surgery to get rid of the stones or the removal of entire gallbladder in worst condition. Thus proper diagnosis of Gallbladder related diseases is very much essential to lead a healthy life.
Most of the disease diagnosis methods are based on spectroscopy i.e. the interaction between matter and electromagnetic radiation. In this context, Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) is believed to be a potential spectroscopic tool, named after the pioneering Indian scientist Sir. C. V. Raman. Recently, Prof. H. Chung and co-workers have reported an advanced SERS-based technique capable of direct measurement of raw bile juice to identify any Gallbladder related disease in the upcoming issue of the journal Sensors & Actuators, B: Chemical [1]. Over other known techniques the reported method is believed to be advantageous as it doesn’t require any pre-treatment process and thus becomes a handy analytical route for fast screening. The group has developed a paper strip based system where specially designed gold nanostructure (of dendrite shape) has been encaged over nickel foam (a cage like morphology of nickel). In this study, Gold nanostructure has been chosen owing to its high SERS efficiency. With such experimental designing, the team has studied the discrimination of various samples of raw bile juice collected from Gallbladder stone and Gallbladder polyp patients. According to the authors, although the reported method is very promising, future activities on accuracy, sampling range etc. are to be performed for making the technique applicable for clinical analysis.
Sources:
[1] T. D. Vu et. al. Sens. Actuators B Chem., 329,129238 (2021).
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0925400520315781