Parasitology

Biography

Biography: David W. Wright

Abstract

There are over 2 billion people on the planet who live on less than $2.00 a day.  What happens when they get sick?  How can they afford to go to the doctor and find out why they don’t fell well?  The solutions for the diagnostic needs of the people living at the bottom of the healthcare pyramid can be found in our children's toy box, the kitchen counter, or on the poster advertising this weekend’s rave.  The creation of ASSURED diagnostic devices requires new, non-traditional approaches for the development of effective tests for parasitic diseases.  In this talk, we will highlight how the principles of everyday objects and phenomena can be adapted for highly sensitive and specific medical tests.

This talk will demonstrate how three different everyday objects have been successfully adopted as low resource diagnostics.  The concepts originate from origami, the ancient art of Japanese paper folding, coffee rings, like those left on the kitchen counter, and glow sticks, a favorite children’s' toy. These new devices provide new solutions to the challenges of field deployable diagnostic tests for the detection of asymptomatic malaria.