Electrochemical lateral flow assay with ELISA-level performance for detecting plant diseases in East Africa.
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 42475572.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1073/pnas.2602947123 and PMC identifier 13416961.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Cassava brown streak disease (CBSD) threatens food security for millions in East Africa, yet its control remains limited by the absence of field-deployable molecular diagnostics. Here, we introduce ELLA (Electrochemical Lateral flow assay with Linked Analytics), a battery-free, smartphone-powered electrochemical lateral flow assay that delivers enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA)-grade protein detection directly in the field. ELLA integrates near-field communication, a single-chip potentiostat, metal-pin electrodes, and ferrocene-labeled nanoparticles into a fully disposable cassette, enabling quantitative immunoassays without optical instrumentation or centralized laboratory infrastructure. Validated across laboratory studies and extensive field trials in Tanzania, ELLA achieved 95% agreement with ELISA and 89% agreement with RT-qPCR, outperforming ELISA's limit of detection while maintaining a material cost below US$1. By coupling molecular test results with cloud-linked analytics, we further trained DeepELLA, a smartphone-based image classification model that enables scalable surveillance from field-acquired leaf images. Together, these advances unify electrochemical sensing, digital connectivity, and AI-assisted interpretation, enabling portable, ELISA-level diagnostics for plant, environmental, and health monitoring in resource-limited regions.
Medical subject headings
- Plant Diseases
- Electrochemical Techniques
- Potyviridae
- Manihot