A droplet-based microfluidic immunosensor for high efficiency melamine analysis

We report a droplet-based microfluidic immunosensor for the rapid and accurate detection of melamine, an organic base that has been implicated in widescale adulteration of food products such as milk. Our melamine assay is based on the competitive reaction between native melamine and a melamine-fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) conjugate against an anti-hapten antibody. The adoption of fluorescence polarization, allows the quantification of melamine in a more direct and rapid manner than established heterogeneous methods based on liquid chromatography, mass spectrometry, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). The detection protocol provides a limit of detection of 300 ppb, which is below the maximum allowable melamine levels (2.5 ppm) defined by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the European Commission to a significant extent.