Figure 6.

An overview of the process, challenges, and future prospects of developing commercial-grade paper-based biosensors. The review paper concluded that sufficient technologies were developed for paper-based biosensors, however, this is merely the first step in the development from the lab to the field. For the future success of paper-based biosensors and to facilitate point-of-care applications, certain aspects, such as device integration, establishing a general standard for device evaluation, and improving the user-friendliness of the device, should be addressed in the near future. To illustrate the step-by-step accomplishment, we have used data from our lab as examples of integrated devices and potential commercial prototypes. The integrated device is a cartridge that contains paper-based strips in the middle. The device under ‘commercialized paper-based biosensors’ is a heating unit that takes the cartridge and provides an output signal. These devices were built in collaboration between Purdue, Raytheon BBN, Cortex Design Inc., and Portascience Inc. (now DCNDx).